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NASA'S COLUMBIA SUPERCOMPUTER IS WORLD'S FASTEST

Silicon Graphics with NASA confirmed that NASA's new Intel Itanium 2 processor-based Columbia supercomputer is the most powerful computer in the world. Only days after NASA completed installation of Columbia—and using just 16 of Columbia's 20 installed systems—the new supercomputer achieved sustained performance of 42.7 trillion calculations per second (teraflops), eclipsing the performance of every supercomputer operating today.

Built from SGI Altix systems and driven by 10,240 Intel Itanium 2 processors, Columbia's 16-system result easily tops Japan's famed Earth Simulator, rated at 35.86 teraflops, and IBM's recent in-house Blue Gene/L experiment, rated at 36.01 teraflops. Columbia's record results were achieved running the LINPACK benchmark on 8,192 of the NASA supercomputer's 10,240 processors. Columbia also achieved an 88 percent efficiency rating on the LINPACK benchmark, the highest efficiency rating ever attained in a LINPACK test on large systems.

While LINPACK is popular as a yardstick of supercomputing performance, NASA is primarily interested in how the Columbia system will revolutionize the rate of scientific discovery at the Agency.

"Benchmarks are useful for confirming that Columbia is meeting our performance expectations, but the numbers we find most significant are something else altogether," said Walt Brooks, division chief, Advanced Supercomputing Division, NASA. "For instance, we find the number five to be significant. This is because with Columbia, scientists are discovering they can potentially predict hurricane paths a full five days before the storms reach landfall – an enormous improvement over today's two-day warnings and one that may present huge advantages for saving human life and property."

"Also significant is the number one," added Brooks, "because with just one of Columbia's 20 Altix systems, we've reduced the time required to perform complex aircraft design analysis from years to a single day."

NASA's Columbia Supercomputer is World's Fastest/2

Nearly every week from late June to mid-October, new Altix systems and storage arrays arrived at NASA. On-site technicians successfully had newly delivered systems up and running the same day. After testing and application software installation, the systems were ready for productive science work in less than a week.

Japan's 5,120-processor Earth Simulator wasn't fully usable for more than four years after inception of the project. But working with SGI engineers, NASA progressively scaled Columbia's capabilities with the installation of each new Altix system. "It's phenomenal how quickly this combined team was bringing the systems up and providing them to users to do real science," said Bill Thigpen, Columbia project manager, NASA. "We had people from throughout NASA and several universities using the first installations within a week of having them hit the floor."

"NASA's Columbia system signals a new approach to supercomputing design, one in which the most powerful computer systems can be deployed in weeks rather than many months or even years," said Earl Joseph, research vice president, High-Performance Systems practice, IDC. "By creating a supercomputing system from industry-standard components and basing it on an already available platform like SGI Altix, NASA has, with relative affordability and ease of installation, recaptured a leading position in supercomputing without resorting to a one-off system type that might have required years of development, installation and testing. Columbia represents a new breed of large scale supercomputer, one that can be replicated at any national laboratory or university."

Now that Columbia is fully operational, NASA plans to accelerate its scientific pursuits in a variety of fields: detailed hurricane predictions, global warming studies, electronic wind tunnel simulations, galaxy formation and supernova analysis, and experiments leading to safer space exploration. With 10,240 processors at their disposal, NASA scientists throughout the U.S. will be able to tackle enormous technical challenges simultaneously, thus helping to dramatically boost productivity and lead to faster discoveries.

For instance, on NASA's previous supercomputers, simulations showing five years worth of changes in ocean temperatures and sea levels were taking a year to model. But using a single SGI Altix system, scientists can simulate decades of ocean circulation in just days, while producing simulations in greater detail than ever before. And the time required to assess flight characteristics of an aircraft design, which involves thousands of complex calculations, dropped from years to a single day.

"With the completion of the Columbia supercomputer, NASA, SGI and Intel have created a powerful national resource, one that will serve scientists who strive to unlock the mysteries of this planet and the universe in which it dwells," said SGI Chairman and CEO Bob Bishop. "NASA should be commended for the remarkable boldness that made Columbia happen. Our long-standing partnership with the Agency has triggered a new age in scientific discovery, and based on NASA's initial success it seems likely that we'll be discussing new scientific breakthroughs in the very near future."

"The launching of the Columbia system shows what's possible when government and technology leaders work together toward a goal of truly national importance," said Paul Otellini, president and COO of Intel Corporation. "While this Itanium 2 processor-based system is expected to be one of the highest performing computers ever created in the world, the real value is how this system will help accelerate scientific design and research faster than before for years to come. NASA's current missions both here on Earth and beyond are the most important ever, and Intel is proud to play a part in their success."

"Unlike other recent supercomputer speed announcements, the Columbia world speed record was attained on a system that is already fully in use at a customer site," said Dave Parry, senior vice president and general manager, Server and Platform Group, SGI. "We're delighted to see the efforts of NASA, SGI and Intel deliver such remarkable results, not only in terms of benchmark superiority, but in the creation of a system that is changing the very nature of science."

NASA unveiled new details of its Columbia supercomputer in a dedication ceremony at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, Calif.

Signaling a new era in deployable supercomputing technology, the Linux OS- based Columbia system is built from the same industry standard, commercially available Altix systems that have been in widespread use throughout the world since SGI introduced Altix in January 2003. Leading automakers, consumer product manufacturers, energy companies, pharmaceutical companies, national laboratories, government agencies and research institutions have adopted the SGI Altix platform, which can scale from 4 to 512 processors in a single system.

In addition to Intel Itanium 2 processors, the Columbia installation features storage technology from Brocade Communications and Engenio Information Technologies, Inc., memory technology from Dataram Corporation and Micron Technology, Inc. and interconnect technology from Voltaire.

SILICON GRAPHICS | The Source of Innovation and Discovery

SGI, also known as Silicon Graphics, Inc., is a leader in high- performance computing, visualization and storage. SGI's vision is to provide technology that enables the most significant scientific and creative breakthroughs of the 21st century. Whether it's sharing images to aid in brain surgery, finding oil more efficiently, studying global climate, providing technologies for homeland security and defense or enabling the transition from analog to digital broadcasting, SGI is dedicated to addressing the next class of challenges for scientific, engineering and creative users. With offices worldwide, the company is headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., and can be found on the Web at http://www.sgi.com.