World's fastest computer

[Drsignguy]

Heard about this today on the news and thought about looking this up. Pretty interesting.

technology.newscientist.com



"Superfast

A spokesperson for the lab said that RoadRunner's daily output was equivalent to each of the 6 billion people on earth using a calculator to crunch numbers for 24 hours a day for 46 years."

 

[Cogman]

"A spokesperson for the lab said that RoadRunner's daily output was equivalent to each of the 6 billion people on earth using a calculator to crunch numbers for 24 hours a day for 46 years." What sort of comparison is that? Sounds like hype to me.

 

[bfdd]

I don't believe the Cells first thought was to be used for a video game console, because it's used in like MIR machines and what not too isn't it?

 

[Peelback79]

So they finally built a computer that can run Crysis maxed out?

 

[Diogenes2]

Originally posted by: Cogman
"A spokesperson for the lab said that RoadRunner's daily output was equivalent to each of the 6 billion people on earth using a calculator to crunch numbers for 24 hours a day for 46 years." What sort of comparison is that? Sounds like hype to me.

Sounds like trying to give someone who doesn't have a clue about what a peta-FlOP
is, something they can comprehend .

 

[deamer44]

haha, donno intergrated graphics card

 

[Drsignguy]

Crysis, easy.... keeping inventory of nuclear weapons that are reliable without doing underground tests by the Department of Energy, a bit more complicated.

 

[Cogman]

Originally posted by: Diogenes2

Originally posted by: Cogman
"A spokesperson for the lab said that RoadRunner's daily output was equivalent to each of the 6 billion people on earth using a calculator to crunch numbers for 24 hours a day for 46 years." What sort of comparison is that? Sounds like hype to me.

Sounds like trying to give someone who doesn't have a clue about what a peta-FlOP
is, something they can comprehend .

and how does that let people know what a PetaFlop is? What is a "Number Crunching" with a calculator, what type of calculator are we talking about? does that count the constant stops people have (it take time to type 1 + 1). It is a bad comparison to say the least that hardly even gives a vague idea of what a peta-flop actually is. All the variables I just mentioned are valid and would throw off what a peta-flop actually is by a large margin if changed.

 

[Drsignguy]

Originally posted by: Cogman

Originally posted by: Diogenes2

Originally posted by: Cogman
"A spokesperson for the lab said that RoadRunner's daily output was equivalent to each of the 6 billion people on earth using a calculator to crunch numbers for 24 hours a day for 46 years." What sort of comparison is that? Sounds like hype to me.

Sounds like trying to give someone who doesn't have a clue about what a peta-FlOP
is, something they can comprehend .

and how does that let people know what a PetaFlop is? What is a "Number Crunching" with a calculator, what type of calculator are we talking about? does that count the constant stops people have (it take time to type 1 + 1). It is a bad comparison to say the least that hardly even gives a vague idea of what a peta-flop actually is. All the variables I just mentioned are valid and would throw off what a peta-flop actually is by a large margin if changed.

Point is, who really cares about that kind of statement. It's just a statement. Real facts? I really didn't look for it. As for what the purpose of this computer was intended for in the first place is really the interesting part. Now that is serious.

 

[PlasmaBomb]

Originally posted by: Drsignguy
A spokesperson for the lab said that RoadRunner's daily output was equivalent to each of the 6 billion people on earth using a calculator to crunch numbers for 24 hours a day for 46 years."

1 petaflop = 1,000,000,000,000,000 floating point operations per second

So in 24 hours Roadrunner will theoretically calculate (1 petaflop x 60 x 60 x 24) = 8.64x10^19 flops (or 86.4 exaflops...)

The article then assumes a human can keep input high enough to max out a simple calculator (10 flops or an input ever 0.1 sec), bearing in mind we are working these poor souls 24/7 that is hugely optimistic... (and gives a result of 45.63 years...)

Lets assume a more realistic 2 inputs and calculations per second...

2 flops x 6x10^9 x 60 x 60 x 24 = a mear 1.04x10^15 (oh look a handy petaflop per day )

At that rate it would take 228.15 years to complete the same amount of work as Roadrunner completes in a day...

 

[aigomorla]

"Built from 13,000 of the Cell processors first used in the PlayStation 3 console, teamed up with nearly 7,000 AMD processors designed for desktop computers, the "RoadRunner" can process information at speeds around twice as fast as the previous fastest computer."

roadrunner is actually known. There just over hyping it. But it is the most powerful computer.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/engl...10/content_8338413.htm

However, using it for gaming is absoutlely stupid.

Thats like me using persephone only for MS Word, and IE Explorer.

Actually those can generate money tho.


Anyhow, watch the intel version called cayote finally catch the BEEP BEEP monster.

Originally posted by: Peelback79
So they finally built a computer that can run Crysis maxed out?

I dont think even the BORG collective could run this smoothly.

 

[waffleironhead]

We in dc land knew the ps3 processor was powerful, just check out folding@home or distributed.net.

 

[Diogenes2]

Originally posted by: Cogman

Originally posted by: Diogenes2

Originally posted by: Cogman
"A spokesperson for the lab said that RoadRunner's daily output was equivalent to each of the 6 billion people on earth using a calculator to crunch numbers for 24 hours a day for 46 years." What sort of comparison is that? Sounds like hype to me.

Sounds like trying to give someone who doesn't have a clue about what a peta-FlOP
is, something they can comprehend .

and how does that let people know what a PetaFlop is? .....

It doesn't ..

Like I said, it's for people who can't comprehend ..


Do you know what a peta-FLOP is ?

 

[killster1]

"Roadrunner will also contribute to solving our global energy challenges, and open new windows of knowledge in the basic scientific research fields," it added


hah prob uses 10 gallons of gas a hour to run!

 

[SlowSpyder]

Originally posted by: Diogenes2

Originally posted by: Cogman

Originally posted by: Diogenes2

Originally posted by: Cogman
"A spokesperson for the lab said that RoadRunner's daily output was equivalent to each of the 6 billion people on earth using a calculator to crunch numbers for 24 hours a day for 46 years." What sort of comparison is that? Sounds like hype to me.

Sounds like trying to give someone who doesn't have a clue about what a peta-FlOP
is, something they can comprehend .

and how does that let people know what a PetaFlop is? .....

It doesn't ..

Like I said, it's for people who can't comprehend ..


Do you know what a peta-FLOP is ?

Right, it's pretty much just there so non techy/scientist types can understand what kind of processing power it has. My mom can understand the idea of every person on earth using a calculator 24 hours a day for 46 years. If I told her it has the ability to calculate peta-FLOP's of information she'd have no idea.

All that CPU power in the PS3, yet it has a 7900 graphics card.

 

[manimal]

I thought a peta flop was the latest ad campaign by those animal rights activists where they used humans in animal testing...

 

[aigomorla]

add an R in peta and you get PETRA!

Woot. one of my favorate computer assessory store!

LOL..

on a serious note, as i said it was too much hype. This is indeed the fastest computer, and the price tag is 100 million dollars.

If you can afford a 100 million dollar computer just to play games, i seriously look up to you man!

No need to argue about it also. As i said if you do indeed have a budget for a 100 million dollar computer, then no one can argue with you on it. Sorry 100 million dollars holds uber weight.

 

[Drsignguy]

Yup, that is a chunk o'change. All wrapped up into the worlds fastest computer. At least they have bragging rights............for now.

 

[aigomorla]

Originally posted by: Drsignguy
Yup, that is a chunk o'change. All wrapped up into the worlds fastest computer. At least they have bragging rights............for now.

as i said, a ghost comany or intel, probably has something much faster that the NSA, and pentagon uses.

Its just uber classified and would put this machine under.

Military always has at least a 10 yrs step ahead of consumer side. :\

 

[Drsignguy]

Originally posted by: aigomorla

Originally posted by: Drsignguy
Yup, that is a chunk o'change. All wrapped up into the worlds fastest computer. At least they have bragging rights............for now.

as i said, a ghost comany or intel, probably has something much faster that the NSA, and pentagon uses.

Its just uber classified and would put this machine under.

Military always has at least a 10 yrs step ahead of consumer side. :\

Oh, I wouldn't doubt it one bit!

 

[nbowman]

Originally posted by: waffleironhead
We in dc land knew the ps3 processor was powerful, just check out folding@home or distributed.net.

The PS3 is powerful, and the roadrunner even more so, as it uses a different cell variant the PowerXCell 8i with even more double precision floating point goodness and a couple other changes.


another thing I find interesting here is that it comes on the heels of this: AMD Fellow ridicules the Power core as too weak for the Cell strip out the usual British sensationalism, and that's basically what he said. and maybe he was right: at the time, I was thinking it was more trash talking from AMD (just what they need to be doin right? ) but maybe hes onto something?

 

[biostud]

yay!!!! nuclear weapons are so much cooler than cure for cancer!

 

[Idontcare]

Originally posted by: biostud
yay!!!! nuclear weapons are so much cooler than cure for cancer!

I beleive the argument is you must have some guns and some butter...all butter and no guns means inevitably some other group which allocated resources towards guns will eventually want a good-sized portion of your butter.

Consider history.

(just a guess, but I'm betting you were born sometime circa 1980's or later)

 

[aigomorla]

Originally posted by: biostud
yay!!!! nuclear weapons are so much cooler than cure for cancer!

honestly, if you have nuclear missles which are all vector dependant on a computer.

That computer controlling the course of that missle better be something out of this world.

The last thing the military would ever want is OOPS we hit city X instead of City Y.


The military is always bragging on how precise there stuff is. Being that accurate comes with great computation power.

 

[Idontcare]

Originally posted by: aigomorla
The military is always bragging on how precise there stuff is. Being that accurate comes with great computation power.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N...se_embassy_in_Belgrade

I've no doubt the accuracy and precision of the military's bombing capability, but sometimes it seems they wish they could argue it is much much less.