🚀 go-pugleaf

Rakesh Malik wrote:
> 
> Pete Wilson (pwi...@dial.pipex.com) wrote:
> : Andy wrote:
> : >
> : > On Fri, 06 Jun 1997 11:22:03 -0700, Levi Cochran
> : > <levi.c...@Ebay.sun.com> wrote:
> : >
> : > > I read about this computer in the paper.
> : > > Isn't the first computer to do a trillion calculations a sec.
> : > > I think it had 200+ PPros in parallel.
> : > >
> : > > All of this could have actually been a dream I had, but I think it's
> : > > pretty close to being correct.
> : >
> : > 200+ PPros in parallel would not make the fastest computer.  Cray
> : > makes supercomputers using 512 500MHz Alphas in parallel.  To make an
> : > Intel-based machine as powerful as this, you'd need to parallel 2048
> : > PPros (large-scale parallelling is done in powers of 2).  This begs
> : > the question: why?  The Alpha solution would be more efficient and
> : > less expensive to implement.
>         That is completely true, 200 PPro's is not a lot of PPro's relative
> to a high-end SGI/Cray supercomputer.  However, the world's fastest computer
> is a supercomputer at Sandia National Labs (I believe they are still an
> afilliate of Lockheed Martin) built around 9,200 PPro 200 CPU's.  It's capable
> of 1.4 teraflops, and has yet to be matched by ANYTHING.  I doubt that
> that will remain the case for long, but today that's the winner.  It's also
> the only one of its kind that I know of.
>         According to rumour, it can boot Windows 95 in under a minute... ;)
> 
>         -Rakesh

Not that they would want to Rakesh (boot Windows 95 that is;). Sandia
and Lockheed are both Mac shops - with about 4,500 Macintosh between
them (SNL: 1,135 - LM: 3,300)

-Ian Bruce