Where Does All the Computer Power Go?

Source: "Supercomputer sets petaflop pace," Jonathan Fildes, BBC News, 9 June 2008.

I quote:

A supercomputer built with components designed for the Sony PlayStation 3 has set a new computing milestone.

The IBM machine, codenamed Roadrunner, has been shown to run at "petaflop speeds", the equivalent of one thousand trillion calculations per second.

The benchmark means the computer is twice as nimble as the current world's fastest machine, also built by IBM.

It will be installed at a US government laboratory later this year where it will monitor the US nuclear stockpile.

It will also be used for research into astronomy, genomics and climate change......

It would be of particular use for calculating risk in financial markets......"The latency of the calculations is so small that for all practical purposes it is real time."

The article also states:

IBM currently has another petaflop machine in the pipeline based on its Blue Gene/P technology.

When finished, it will be the world's fastest commercial supercomputer.

"Blue Gene/P continues the path of Blue/Gene L," said Dr Davari.

The machines share much of the same software and hardware.

Blue Gene/P will be installed at the Department of Energy's (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois later this year.

Both Sun and Cray supercomputers have also unveiled plans for petaflop machines in the near future.