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Argonne National Laboratory awards Cray contract for 180 Petaflops supercomputer

30 points by davidmr 12y ago

davidmr 12y ago
Having worked at ANL in the past on other supercomputers, this is an especially impressive and interesting contract. 180PF, even in 2018 is by any definition an absolute monster of a system. It's also very interesting that the contract was awarded to Cray and not to IBM. ANL's first two supers, Intrepid and Mira, are both IBM Blue Genes. This must be a very exciting day for ANL and Cray. Congrats!
- filereaper 12y ago
  Both Cray and IBM were in the competition for the next supercomputers for: - Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) - Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) - Argonne National Naboratory (ANL) IBM won LLNL and ORNL to create the upcoming Sierra and Summit Supercomputers. We heard down the grapevine that ANL wanted an IBM based system as well, but due to the rules of the competition they were given the Cray system. So the rumour goes anyways, I'm not in the inner circle.
  - davidmr 12y ago
    That doesn't surprise me at all. The DOE keeps more options open by selecting different vendors for the same generation installs. In the last generation, LLNL and ANL were IBM and ORNL was the Cray. That said, I'm long since out of whatever circle it was that I was in (certainly not the inner one!) as well so I speak with no authority whatsoever.
    - batbomb 12y ago
      NERSC just put Hopper, a cray xe6, online for general use last year. It clocks in at only 1.3 petaflops.
- agumonkey 12y ago
  So, I guess I'll have to take the 'ExaScale computing is coming' articles with a grain of salt. Also happy for Cray.
  - davidmr 12y ago
    This will be a 10x improvement in the 6 years since Titan was built and will get within nearly 20% of an exaflop. How does this not constitute a huge step toward exascale computing?
    - agumonkey 12y ago
      I was under the impression that 2018 would see exascale supercomputers produced.
      - davidmr 12y ago
        So was Computer World magazine, but wishing don't make it so. It's hard stuff! If we had the gear tomorrow, I sincerely doubt anyone would know how to write efficient applications for it.
        agumonkey 12y ago
        Hehe, I was actually wondering what kind of programs (need to be) run on this and how they're written.
ericHosick 12y ago
To put this in perspective, as of 11/2014, the aggregated computing power of the top 500 supercomputers is 308.9 Petaflops (http://www.top500.org/ http://www.top500.org/).
deleted 12y ago
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niels_olson 12y ago
For some reason, I don't think it's coincidence that Guangzhou Supercomputer Center got put on the US Technology “Denial List” and Argonne awarded Cray a 180 Petaflop sale.
- davidmr 12y ago
  The DOE announced the awards for ORNL and LLNL last November, and there wasn't a similar announcement about then, I don't see why today's is any more relevant. That said, I doubt it comes as a surprise to the Chinese government, but it's kind of an ironic stick in the eye given what the DOE's mission is (and what the supercomputer at LLNL is used for). I suppose I don't blame the US government as I'm guessing the law prevents US companies from exporting devices used for nuclear weapons, but it's definitely a dick move.
  - stox 12y ago
    Currently, there is only one thing the Chinese supercomputers are good at. Running Linpack. Give it time, and the Chinese will build up the library and experience to fully take advantage of the resource. In the mean time, we're not going to help them much. The single biggest consumer of Supercomputing cycles is the DOE for Fusion^H^H^H^H^HSuperNova simulations. They'll chew this up in no time. At least this is being located at the LCF, so it will be open to all sorts of academic usage, too. [ added ] Teach me not to read the news earlier. Not a bright move, cutting off the Chinese from Xeons and the like will only drive them to develop all the tech themselves. While I do not believe we should be handing them tech on a silver platter, it is actually worse to cut them off.
jedbrown 12y ago
This title is incorrect. Intel is the prime contractor (for the first time since ASCI Red) and Cray is the subcontractor. http://energy.gov/articles/us-department-energy-awards-200-million-next-generation-supercomputer-argonne-national http://energy.gov/articles/us-department-energy-awards-200-m...
- deleted 12y ago
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30 points by davidmr 12y ago

Having worked at ANL in the past on other supercomputers, this is an especially impressive and interesting contract. 180PF, even in 2018 is by any definition an absolute monster of a system. It's also very interesting that the contract was awarded to Cray and not to IBM. ANL's first two supers, Intrepid and Mira, are both IBM Blue Genes. This must be a very exciting day for ANL and Cray. Congrats!

filereaper 12y ago
Both Cray and IBM were in the competition for the next supercomputers for: - Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) - Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) - Argonne National Naboratory (ANL) IBM won LLNL and ORNL to create the upcoming Sierra and Summit Supercomputers. We heard down the grapevine that ANL wanted an IBM based system as well, but due to the rules of the competition they were given the Cray system. So the rumour goes anyways, I'm not in the inner circle.
- davidmr 12y ago
  That doesn't surprise me at all. The DOE keeps more options open by selecting different vendors for the same generation installs. In the last generation, LLNL and ANL were IBM and ORNL was the Cray. That said, I'm long since out of whatever circle it was that I was in (certainly not the inner one!) as well so I speak with no authority whatsoever.
  - batbomb 12y ago
    NERSC just put Hopper, a cray xe6, online for general use last year. It clocks in at only 1.3 petaflops.
agumonkey 12y ago
So, I guess I'll have to take the 'ExaScale computing is coming' articles with a grain of salt. Also happy for Cray.
- davidmr 12y ago
  This will be a 10x improvement in the 6 years since Titan was built and will get within nearly 20% of an exaflop. How does this not constitute a huge step toward exascale computing?
  - agumonkey 12y ago
    I was under the impression that 2018 would see exascale supercomputers produced.
    - davidmr 12y ago
      So was Computer World magazine, but wishing don't make it so. It's hard stuff! If we had the gear tomorrow, I sincerely doubt anyone would know how to write efficient applications for it.
      - agumonkey 12y ago
        Hehe, I was actually wondering what kind of programs (need to be) run on this and how they're written.

ericHosick 12y ago

To put this in perspective, as of 11/2014, the aggregated computing power of the top 500 supercomputers is 308.9 Petaflops (http://www.top500.org/ http://www.top500.org/).

deleted 12y ago

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niels_olson 12y ago

For some reason, I don't think it's coincidence that Guangzhou Supercomputer Center got put on the US Technology “Denial List” and Argonne awarded Cray a 180 Petaflop sale.

davidmr 12y ago
The DOE announced the awards for ORNL and LLNL last November, and there wasn't a similar announcement about then, I don't see why today's is any more relevant. That said, I doubt it comes as a surprise to the Chinese government, but it's kind of an ironic stick in the eye given what the DOE's mission is (and what the supercomputer at LLNL is used for). I suppose I don't blame the US government as I'm guessing the law prevents US companies from exporting devices used for nuclear weapons, but it's definitely a dick move.
- stox 12y ago
  Currently, there is only one thing the Chinese supercomputers are good at. Running Linpack. Give it time, and the Chinese will build up the library and experience to fully take advantage of the resource. In the mean time, we're not going to help them much. The single biggest consumer of Supercomputing cycles is the DOE for Fusion^H^H^H^H^HSuperNova simulations. They'll chew this up in no time. At least this is being located at the LCF, so it will be open to all sorts of academic usage, too. [ added ] Teach me not to read the news earlier. Not a bright move, cutting off the Chinese from Xeons and the like will only drive them to develop all the tech themselves. While I do not believe we should be handing them tech on a silver platter, it is actually worse to cut them off.

jedbrown 12y ago

This title is incorrect. Intel is the prime contractor (for the first time since ASCI Red) and Cray is the subcontractor. http://energy.gov/articles/us-department-energy-awards-200-million-next-generation-supercomputer-argonne-national http://energy.gov/articles/us-department-energy-awards-200-m...

deleted 12y ago
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