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Topic: China

Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

Summary: The unfinished Fujitsu K Computer, at more than 8 petaflops, is more than three times more powerful than China's second place machine.

Andy Smith

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Japan's K Computer took over first place as the top-performing supercomputer in the world as determined by the Top500 Supercomputing List. The K Computer, which is housed at the Riken Advanced Institute for Computational Science in Kobe, has 672 computer racks and 68,544 CPUs. This system achieved a LINPACK benchmark performance of 8.162 petaflops (quadrillion floating-point operations per second).

But this supercomputer isn't even finished. That should happen in November 2012 when it is expected to house more than 800 computer racks and exceed 10 petaflops.

For more on the supercomputer showdown, read Larry Dignan's blog. And Steven Vaughan-Nichols tells why Linux powers the fastest supercomputers.

Photo: Riken

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Topic: China

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  • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

    I think you've misspelled "computer" multiple times.
    ThomasB2k
    Reply Vote

  • World's top supercomputer, for now...

    In 10 years the even more powerful "U" computer will be the size of a laptop and cost $1899.95 with a $20 rebate. As it is with people so it is with computers: the amazing physical hardware is cheap to reproduce, it's the culture and education of the individual that's expensive. I would assume the "K" isn't just for checking emal and surfing. Who uses it for what then? That's the interesting question.
    leifharmsen
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

      @leifharmsen One use would be prediction models, like an earth simulation, or a virtual reconstruction of the Big Bang. A distributed computing project like Seti@Home would probably love to have something like the K in its network.
      deadfraggle
      Reply Vote

    • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

      @leifharmsen

      Modelling things like the effects of earthquakes and tsunamis on nuclear power plants so that future designs will not fail as spectacularly as Fukajima.
      bannedagain
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

        It's not the modeling that's lacking, as the the lack of common sense of designers. Fukushima's cooling generators should've been built uphill away from the plant and potential floodwaters. Ft. Calhoun, potentially many times worse, is already experiencing flooding conditions, and the snowpacks are barely starting to melt after this hard winter's snow.
        badi335
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

        @bannedagain
        I watched that Fukashima scene with "WTF were they thinking?". There's the Nuclear plant and what's that I hear? Oh, a tsunami siren. Are you nuts? Could someone with a picogram of brains figured out that a tsunami site, complete with a siren, wasn't the best choice for a nuclear reactor?
        trm1945
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

        Supercomputing has done an amazing jobs..You've got to be there to see these projects behind these supercomputing.. Fukajima was built before supercomputing era. Instead of buildings with different constructions for testing, UCSD was able to stimulate many different scenarios and construction types. It cutting down time and money tremendously. When they finalize down to 3 buildings, then UCSD and its partners to build real building for testings. Simple words could not describe the potential of supercomputing.
        There are thousand of on going projects utilizing these busy supercomputing center.
        Most of these projects have served its purposes. The only problem I see from the inside is sharing these information or commercialize them or license so private companies can take to the next level.
        I have been working closely with movies studios to create billion dollars industry every year. Instead of building their own, studios can rent or lease these processing time so they can cut down the time, improve efficiency and money to produce high quality movies with cool special effects.
        Simply amazing..The Japanese and German know how to share these supercomputing for both commercial and research purposes.
        Netteligent
        Reply Vote

    • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

      @leifharmsen
      Apparently you didn't bother to get to the last slide, then.
      DeusXMachina
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

        @DeusXMachina LOL!!!!! I guess he didn't =P
        victorhugo1707@...
        Reply Vote

  • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

    @deadfraggle Or figure out where the water on earth came from ? An is there more where that came from ? very exciting
    iguanaware
    Reply Vote

  • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

    Can't wait to play Duke Nukem Forever on that machine...
    josjoskens@...
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

      @josjoskens@... You and me both, man.
      razorsyntax
      Reply Vote

  • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

    My prediction is that it will be obsolete just a few short weeks after it is done. It is going to be hard to be the best with 45 nm technology.
    atwood@...
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

      @atwood@...

      Um, what?!?
      Wanna bet?
      DeusXMachina
      Reply Vote

  • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

    Call me crazy - and I know you'll want to - but, I'd put the entire thing to work designing its successor. There's no denying that our technology has given us the evolutionary edge we need to render the indifference of nature to our survival moot. Computing power is what will solve the problems of mortality and cognitive failure. Perhaps even the world's best supercomputer today isn't up to that task, but one of its successors will be. THAT's what this computer should be working on.
    Naumadd
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

      @Naumadd

      And how would you do that? Do you even know how computers work. Hint: software isn't just people typing questions into a black box.
      DeusXMachina
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

        @DeusXMachina He doesn't have to know.. but there are those who do.
        froggy57
        Reply Vote

    • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

      @Naumadd I'm thinking map out each neuron in the human mind and simulate the brain! Then we can call that new supercomputer Skynet and unleash it upon the world! Woo!
      razorsyntax
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

        @razorsyntax

        ditto on that
        aiellenon
        Reply Vote

    • RE: Gallery: Inside Japan's K Computer - world's top supercomputer

      @Naumadd
      Was not this the idea of 'Deep Thought' who designed the Earth (Hitch-Hikers Guide fans step in now). ;)
      geoffrey.seymour
      Reply Vote
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