Cool.

At least until they change the name to AM.

/hate

what do you do with something that fast?

I imagine it would sit idle 99.9% of the time while you feed it commands.

It could talk all four legs off an Arcturan Mega Donkey. But only I could persuade it to go for a walk afterwards.

It would still run Metro 2033 poorly.

I still think it's cute that Top500 thinks all the government supercomputers make that list.

Who doesn't think that NSA, CIA, Department of Energy, DoD, Russian FSB, the Israelis, French MoD, UK intelligence, Japanese and Chinese don't have supercomputers that will blow the Top500 machines out of the water?

bigstoopidbruce: It could talk all four legs off an Arcturan Mega Donkey. But only I could persuade it to go for a walk afterwards.

Was it designed by mice?

Can you imagine a Beowulf cluster of these?

\sorry, wrong website

Is this computer any smarter than it's predecessors?

Most computers are about as smart as a decapitated roach.

clovis69: I still think it's cute that Top500 thinks all the government supercomputers make that list.

What makes you think that the people behind the Top500 list think they document every fast computer installation in the world.

So we're 7 & 1/2 million years from getting an answer out of it, then?

madcan34: what do you do with something that fast?

I imagine it would sit idle 99.9% of the time while you feed it commands.

Given computer scientists' MO? Calculate pi really really far.

madcan34: what do you do with something that fast?

If it were up to me, Lattice QCD.
Each calculation takes months on huge farms, and even these are considerably simplified cases...

/As forrest gump eloquently said: Sometimes there's just not enough nodes.

It's getting needlessly messianic.

clovis69: Department of Energy

Several of the computers on the list are at Department of Energy sites. Indeed the DoE is a consistent customer for very very fast computers.

And to finish up my point, the DoE has no reason to not admit to all the supercomputers they have. While some of what they do with them is classified, that they have them, and where they have them is not something they have any reason to keep from public view.

WhyteRaven74: Several of the computers on the list are at Department of Energy sites. Indeed the DoE is a consistent customer for very very fast computers.

That doesn't mean they are all on there. I knew a woman who worked at Los Alamos on water vapor modeling in the atmosphere and used to go over to Japan yearly to talk to their super computer people. She said the Japanese had some stuff that like ours, never made the list, and the overt Japanese stuff could beat the pants off anything at Sandia or Los Alamos.

It's fast, but the skimped on the graphics card and LOLCat .gifs load up really slowly.

still takes forever to render a motion blur in PS @ high quality.

My van is the fastest car I've ever seen. It can seat 12 people!

/Capacity != speed.

FTFA:The K supercomputer uses 88,128 SPARC64 VIIIfx CPUs across 864 computing racks.
Sweeeeeet.

Honest Bender: My van is the fastest car I've ever seen. It can seat 12 people!

/Capacity != speed.

But all the code is massively parallel. Capacity == speed, effectively... cheers

I can't believe no one has asked yet...

But can it run Crysis?

FTFA There's no word yet on what the K supercomputer will be used, for but surely it will be one of our computer overlords when the robot apocalypse comes.

Where, do, commas, go, again?,

FYI, this (new window) is the fastest computer in the world.

Stinger: I can't believe no one has asked yet...

But can it run Crysis?

Sadly no... over 100,000 CPUs, but no GPU.

farknozzle: So we're 7 & 1/2 million years from getting an answer out of it, then?

What, not til next week?

So powerful it managed to render this image of itself:

Stinger: I can't believe no one has asked yet...

But can it run Crysis?

At a paltry 20fps on ultra high quality.

madcan34: what do you do with something that fast?

I imagine it would sit idle 99.9% of the time while you feed it commands.

This is why we have things called "programs" which contain "instructions" that the computer can "fetch" at its own "pace"

BTW Lawrence Livermore lab is getting a 20 petaflop IBM Glue Gene/Q computer that'll be fully up and running fairly soon.

I was kinda hoping TFA would have mentioned the power consumption.

And Outlook still won't load fast

"the K supercomputer is more than likely to hold its number-1 position for some time to come"

..until Blue Gene q - doubles that in 2012

WhyteRaven74: BTW Lawrence Livermore lab is getting a 20 petaflop IBM Glue Gene/Q computer that'll be fully up and running fairly soon.

That's why I buy my computers in the spring.

But can it play World In Conflict?

WhyteRaven74: BTW Lawrence Livermore lab is getting a 20 petaflop IBM Glue Gene/Q computer that'll be fully up and running fairly soon.

GrrrrrRAH


\GrrrrRah
\GRRRrrrrRRRrrrrrRRRRrrrrRAH

clovis69: WhyteRaven74: Several of the computers on the list are at Department of Energy sites. Indeed the DoE is a consistent customer for very very fast computers.

That doesn't mean they are all on there.

The DOE doesn't really bother to keep their classified supercomputers secret. Heck, you can see them on Google Earth (e.g., at Los Alamos look for the big building with giant cooling unit right next door). It's not that big of a secret. Given our nuclear capabilities, and other countries', there isn't a lot of security value to knowing how much computing power the U.S. can throw at verifying the nuclear arsenal. This is different from, say, knowing how much computing the NSA can throw at codebreaking or data mining.

sawzallz: I was kinda hoping TFA would have mentioned the power consumption.

Well the new 20 petaflop computer Lawrence Livermore is getting will consume around 6.6 megawatts

Where is Carl Rossum to give the pr speech?

n00b here.

How does this stack up against the human brain? Better? Worse?

n00b out.

Does this computer have a functional purpose aside from giving its creators a reason to wave their dicks in the air in triumph?

Kirkenhegelstein: n00b here.

How does this stack up against the human brain? Better? Worse?

n00b out.

The human brain and a computer have very different purposes. For most things a computer is for, a human brain is notably inferior, because if it were the other way around that would defeat the whole purpose of building tools to do things.

A brain runs at about 10^16 synapses/sec, though, if that's what you're asking.

Lou Brown: Does this computer have a functional purpose aside from giving its creators a reason to wave their dicks in the air in triumph?

Modeling, usually. Even static Schrodinger equation solutions can send a pretty big array into the corner muttering to itself for a week before it gives you the answer. Chucking on a few more processors cuts down that time a bit, assuming your program is designed properly.

WhyteRaven74: sawzallz: I was kinda hoping TFA would have mentioned the power consumption.

Well the new 20 petaflop computer Lawrence Livermore is getting will consume around 6.6 megawatts

Considering my entire data center is backed up by only two 1mw gens, I am impressed!