Currently, the world s fastest computer is the Tianhe-3, developed by Chinese scientists. However, this technology has not yet been adopted for commercial purposes, and the next-generation Tianhe-5 is still a few years away.
Sunway Taihulight
Until recently, the fastest computer in the world was the Tianhe-2, which was built on an Intel architecture. The Tianhe-2 was the world’s top supercomputer for three years. But now, the Chinese state-run Sunway TaihuLight supercomputer has taken the lead.
The new supercomputer is two times more powerful than the previous record holder. And it has a theoretical top speed of 125 petaflops, which means it can perform 125 million trillion calculations per second. Its computational heart is a ShenWei SW26010 processor, which was designed by the Shanghai High Performance IC Design Center. This processor has 260 cores, which can deliver 3 teraflops of performance.
The machine is built at the National Supercomputing Center in Wuxi, China. Its applications focus on earth system modeling and weather and climate forecasting. It has also been used to process big data sent via satellite radars.
The machine is installed in a 1,000-square-meter computer room. It has a total of 40,960 nodes, each of which consists of four computing processing elements (CGs).
The Sunway TaihuLight supercomputer was developed by the National Research Center of Parallel Computer Engineering and Technology, which is part of the National Supercomputing Center in Wuxi, Jiangsu province. Its R&D cost was 1.8 billion RMBs. It was funded by the city of Wuxi and the province of Jiangsu. It is estimated that it will cost another 1.7 billion RMBs to maintain the machine.
Titan
Located at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Titan is the world’s fastest computer. The Titan supercomputer combines traditional CPUs with graphics processing units (GPUs), and achieves a peak performance of 27 petaflops.
The GPUs offer much more simultaneous threads than the CPUs do, and the combination of the two increases the machine’s performance. The Titan uses 18,688 NVIDIA Tesla K20 GPUs.
The CUDA software platform made it possible. The GPUs also allow the system to perform the same operation on multiple pieces of data. This will enable faster execution of some scientific applications.
The Titan’s storage will be able to hold up to 40 petabytes of data, which is the equivalent of 227,000 miles of stacked books. The 40PB of storage will be spread over 20,000 disk drives. The Titan will also be able to process 1.4 terabytes per second.
The Titan is designed to speed up the pace of discovery. The system is designed to help researchers in several different fields, including materials research, nuclear energy, climate modeling, medical imaging technologies, and more.
Researchers will be able to use the supercomputer to model physical phenomena, such as blood flow, human skin, and the effect suspended particles have on the environment. Scientists will also be able to use the system to run four to five jobs at the same time.
The project is also aimed at helping the United States develop next generation materials for our goods. The research will include nuclear power simulations and in-depth atmospheric calculations.
SuperMUC-NG
Powered by Lenovo’s innovative Neptune(tm) direct water-cooling technology, SuperMUC-NG will deliver a theoretical peak performance of 26.7 petaflops, the most powerful system in the world. This will enable the Leibniz Supercomputing Center (LRZ) to solve critical astrophysical and biomedical challenges.
In addition to providing 26.7 petaflops of computing power, the SuperMUC-NG system will also provide a secure, highly available HPC service for researchers. In addition, the system will offer innovative visualization results. The supercomputer will be built using Lenovo’s Intelligent Computing Orchestrator, a cloud-based component that offers an intuitive, graphical user interface.
LRZ has long been known for energy efficiency. The supercomputer is designed to run on 100 percent renewable energy, and waste heat is repurposed to power cold generation in adsorption chillers.
The system features Intel Xeon Platinum 8280 processors, Intel Xeon Scalable processors, and Intel Omni-Path Architecture. In addition, SuperMUC-NG will use Lenovo’s Intelligent Computing Orchestrator to empower researchers at LRZ. The technology provides an intuitive interface that empowers users to quickly execute a wide variety of compute tasks. It will also help reduce total cost of ownership.
The SuperMUC-NG system is equipped with a DAOS storage system, which is interconnected with a high-speed network. The software includes Intel OSPRay engine and VisIt application, which are open source interactive parallel visualization tools. The system is backed by an intelligent management suite that will help researchers at LRZ manage their workloads.
Tianhe-3
Developing a supercomputer that can perform one quintillion calculations per second will take China a few years, but the Chinese government hopes to have the world’s first exascale supercomputer up and running before 2023. Currently, the fastest computer on Earth is Sunway TaihuLight, which has the ability to process more than 125 quadrillion calculations per second.
China is stepping up research on Tianhe-3, the name given to the new exascale machine. Tianhe-3 is a new computer that will be built by the National Supercomputing Center in Tianjin. The system will have a peak exaflop performance of about two billion billion calculations per second.
Tianhe-3 will be built using three high-performance computing chips. It is expected to have 100 times more storage capacity than the previous model. The prototype is expected to be completed by the end of this year. It will be able to pass Linpack test. The new computer will be used in applications such as deep learning and autonomous driving. It will help improve artificial intelligence capabilities and create new business models. It will also be an important platform for the country’s scientific development.
The supercomputer will be able to work on data from information security, new materials and energy, and ocean exploration. It will also be able to pull together all of these data sets to produce the most comprehensive analysis ever.
A Tianhe-3 prototype has already been tested for over 30 organizations in China. It has provided computing services to over 50 applications.
AI Bridging Cloud Infrastructure
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It’s not the best way to spend your hard earned money. A qualified consultant can help you select the right supercomputer for your specific needs.
Trinity
Among the many new and improved supercomputers being built and tested, one machine has caught the fancy of the scientific and technical community. Named the Cray Trinity, the system is destined for a secure location where the nation’s most sensitive data will be housed. The system will not only be able to simulate nuclear stockpiles, but will be able to host classified national security applications. It is also touted as the world’s most powerful computer.
Despite its storied status, the Trinity is only the latest of several high performance computers being developed at Los Alamos National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratory. It is a surprisingly capable system that uses the Cray Linux Environment Operating System to handle its tasks. Using a modern Intel Xeon Phi processor, the Trinity can perform hundreds of thousands of computed operations per second. It boasts a 5,200 square foot floor space and a triumvirate of teraflops. Its most impressive feature is the fact that it can also accommodate a large number of users.
There is a large list of machines that are vying for the title of the world’s most powerful, but a handful of machines have ascended to the top spot. Among the winners are the aforementioned Trinity and the AI-powered Japanese machine called the AIBCC. The aforementioned AIBCC is not to be confused with the AIBRCC, which is an unclassified sibling to the more expensive Trinity.