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US takes supercomputing lead
Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 8:02 am
by highdesert
IBM's Sequoia has taken the top spot on the list of the world's fastest supercomputers for the US. The newly installed system trumped Japan's K Computer made by Fujitsu which fell to second place. It is the first time the US can claim pole position since it was beaten by China two years ago. Sequoia will be used to carry out simulations to help extend the life of aging nuclear weapons, avoiding the need for real-world underground tests. It is installed at the US Department of Energy's Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California.
The computer is capable of calculating in one hour what otherwise would take 6.7 billion people using hand calculators 320 years to complete if they worked non-stop.
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-18457716
Re: US takes supercomputing lead
Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 8:54 am
by gendoikari87
I'll be glad when we create the quantum computer and we stop trying to boast the fastest computer.... okay, so when the fastest computer will be irrelevant, we will never stop pulling out the measuring sticks.
Re: US takes supercomputing lead
Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 11:38 am
by SwampGrouch
gendoikari87 wrote:we will never stop pulling out the measuring sticks.
What else should we expect from a society that values professional athletes more than good teachers?
Re: US takes supercomputing lead
Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 11:42 am
by gendoikari87
SwampGrouch wrote:gendoikari87 wrote:we will never stop pulling out the measuring sticks.
What else should we expect from a society that values professional athletes more than good teachers?
But those athletes they add so much to society, what have those stupid teachers done?
Re: US takes supercomputing lead
Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 12:31 pm
by Elmo
I've been working in IT long enough to remember when the U.S. (IBM) lost the supercomputing lead for the first time to Japan (Fujitsu or Hitachi?). In the 80s, if memory serves.
Considering that the U.S. had the unquestioned lead in computing since the invention of semiconductors, and even earlier, this was quite an earth-shattering event in U.S. IT circles. Almost like the Sputnik a generation earlier.
Re: US takes supercomputing lead
Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 2:35 pm
by Awake
So much computing power, engineering talent, energy, taxpayer money wasted.
Hubble space telescope is supposed to be a wonder of wonders, yet now the US government is trying to just give away 3 'secret' spare space telescopes that they never used and are obsolete that are more powerful than Hubble. There is some really amazing and hidden hardware out there.
Supposedly the NSA can listen to, digitize, break and analyze every single phone conversation in the USA, plus all the conversations in the world that they can somehow intercept, in any language, all in real time. They probably have computers that make these computing champions look like minor nodes.