[Am-info] Go Big Mac!

[Fred Miller]

Go Big Mac!


Va. Tech Creates Third-Fastest Computer

Nov 8, 12:40 PM (ET)

By CHRIS KAHN

BLACKSBURG, Va. (AP) - A cluster of 1,100 Macintosh PCs stacked like 
library books in a squat cement building at the outskirts of Virginia 
Tech's campus - arranged by students in exchange for football tickets 
and pizza - is about to rank as the world's third-fastest supercomputer, 
at 10.3 trillion operations per second.

The off-the-shelf G5 Power Macs, or the "Big Mac" as students have begun 
calling it, costs about $7 million, significantly less than the custom 
supercomputers that labs use for weather and weapons simulations, drug 
experiments and other highly complex projects.

"It's really quite impressive," said Jack Dongarra, a computer science 
professor at the University of Tennessee who compiles an annual list of 
the top 500 supercomputers. "They're now competing in terms of 
performance with our foremost research facilities."

Dongarra, who will release the 2003 rankings on Nov. 17, said he expects 
the only faster supercomputers to be the Earth Simulator Center in 
Japan, which cost at least $250 million and has been clocked at 33.9 
trillion operations per second; and a computer at Los Alamos National 
Laboratory (clocked at 13.9 trillion operations per second) made for 
$215 million.

As impressive as Big Mac is, some experts believe the supercomputer 
business probably need not fear a new generation of home-brew rivals.

"To be honest, these clusters have their trouble points," said Ed 
Seidel, who supervises a computer cluster at Louisiana State University. 
"You know how often your own PC fails sometimes? Just think of 1,000 
computers. Custom-built systems are more reliable at times - they were 
engineered to be supercomputers."

Even so, Virginia Tech's computer cluster dwarfs the power of other 
computer clusters.

Each of the 1,100 Macs has two IBM PowerPC 970 microprocessors that are 
based on a relatively new 64-bit design, which means they process data 
in chunks of 64 bits - a method exponentially faster than older, 32-bit 
technology. The processors are connected by a high-speed network called 
Infiniband that allows them to break up major calculations and analyze 
each part at the same time.

Virginia Tech quantum chemist Daniel Crawford said Big Mac will shorten 
the time he spends building computer models of chemicals from years to 
just days.

"It opens an entire new area of chemistry," said Crawford, who will be 
one of the first to use the computer in December. Before Big Mac, 
Crawford would have to wait in line to use part of another computer. 
"You could spend your entire career on just a few calculations."

Project leader Srinidhi Varadarajan said other universities will likely 
follow with even faster clusters, drawn as Virginia Tech was to the 
cheap components and the pressure to enhance their academic reputation 
despite severe budget cuts.

Dan Powers, vice president of grid computing strategy at IBM Corp., says 
he's not worried about such off-the-shelf PC clusters threatening sales 
of traditional supercomputers.

For one thing, Powers says, the Big Mac project took a lot of labor that 
Virginia Tech was able to get for free.

Virginia Tech's 160 student volunteers spent days removing the computers 
from their boxes, installing communications software and loading them on 
rows of liquid-cooled metal racks.

Powers said almost all supercomputer users would rather pay the $100,000 
to $10 million for a supercomputer than try to build their own. (Highly 
advanced models range closer to $200 million.)

But Apple Computer Vice President Greg Joswiak said the company is 
getting phone calls from other institutions interested in duplicating 
Big Mac's success.

Varadarajan and his staff have spent the past six weeks running test 
programs, teaching Big Mac to think faster. The supercomputer already 
has added about 3 trillion operations per second to its initial 
performance benchmark.

"This is like tweaking a race car," he said.

-- 
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