A Sneak Peak Into The World’s Fastest Computer

Every 6 months a list of the top 500 fastest computers is prepared and we do get to see some amazing works of technology in this list. This time its Jaguar that cracked the list and others stood nowhere near this amazingy super machine. The performance benchmark for Jaguar was 69% better than IBM Roadrunner that could grab the second position. Let us directly take a quick look on the statistics of this power machine which only the nerdiest of nerdy could begin to comprehend:

• Operating System: SUSE Linux (The cray custom version).
• System Type: Cray XT5.
• Total Disk Space: 10 Peta Bytes.
• Total RAM: 300 Tera Byte (and you thought only 4 or at max 8 GB was the limit?)
• Processor Cores: 224, 256
• Processors: 37,376 six-core AMD Opteron 2.6 GHz (I can at least boast that my laptop has 2.6 GHz speed though I don’t have that weird looking 37,376 six core in it;) )
• Performance: The theoretical maximum as per various researches is 2.33 petaflops and this machine boasts of touching 1.759 petaflops. I hope few out there didn’t get heart attacks!

If you still haven’t understood the numbers written above then let me explain: that 1.759 peraflops means that Jaguar is capable of performing 2,330,000,000,000,000 operations per second. Don’t ask me to write that number in words as I don’t have the time to count the number of zeros! The Xt5 Cray setup of this awesome machine takes over 4400 square feet of ground which is larger than that of a NBA court. As of now the processing power of Jaguar is being used to run various simulations related to climate changes, and to run other similar powerful applications.

Though Jaguar has been around for some years, it has never touched the top spot until now. The reason behind this was due to the quad core processor being used in the Jaguar. Recently the quad core processor was replaced with six-core processors which actually increased the processor cores by 50 percent. This was enough for Jaguar to leave behind the likes of IBM. Now its time to actually enjoy the ‘sexy’ looks of Jaguar!



One Response to “A Sneak Peak Into The World’s Fastest Computer”

1. Mathew Carpenter says:

   November 17, 2009 at 1:59 pm

   If you’re going to take photos of my computer, in my house, without me though, please do let me know in advance.