More on Virginia Tech G5 Cluster: 17.6 Tflops

daveschroeder writes "BBC World's Click Online has a video report (with text transcript) on Virginia Tech's new 1100-node dual 2.0 GHz G5 Terascale Cluster. The report quotes the performance as 17.6 Tflops. As a point of reference, the cluster would be number 2 on the most recent June Top 500 list, behind only Japan's Earth Simulator, and considerably more than doubling the performance of the current number 3 1152-node dual 2.4 GHz Xeon MCR Linux cluster. Assuming the performance figure accurately reflects the LINPACK score (which it should; since the deadline for submissions for the upcoming list of Oct 1 has already passed, one would imagine VT would quote that figure), and depending on new entries for November's upcoming list, the cluster should almost certainly rank in the top 5 - all for only US$5.2 million. The video report is available in Windows Media 9 and Real formats; the relevant portion starts at 13:00."

Re:Can the results be trusted?

[Usquebaugh]

Yep, and they're going to be top 5. Between you and them I wonder who has the best knowledge of how to build a cost efficient cluster?

17.6 TFLOPS is Rpeak, not Rmax!

[DeeKay]

Simple equation: 4 FPops/cycle (IBM-PPCs) * 2GHz * 1100 G5s * 2 CPUs/G5 = 17.6 TFLOPS!

No *real* Rmax linpack scores are known yet, and from what i figured the submissions on Oct 1st are just for *inclusion* in the list, real Linpack scores can be submitted till shortly before (or even on!) the conference mid-November..

This article is BS and should be removed...

P.S.: 4 FPops/cycle per clock with 2 FPUs i hear you scream - Impossible! - That's due the Multiply/Add FMAC thing that counts as 2 FPops!

Re:Twice as fast...?

[Blondie-Wan]

You obviously haven't been paying attention. The Mac world stopped crowing about the G4's superiority over other systems once it became clear it no longer was (if it had been to begin with), i.e., as the MHz gap got wider and wider. Prior to the G5 intro at WWDC, Steve hadn't run one of his keynote Photoshop bake-offs in a while; even he wasn't claiming dual ~1 GHz G4 systems were faster than what the Wintel world could offer. Many people pointed out (correctly) that there was still a MHz myth and that the Macs weren't as slower than the Wintel systems as the numbers might imply, but on the whole, most Mac people were certainly conceding at the beginning of this year that the fastest PCs were faster than the fastest Macs.