IBM to build Fastest Supercomputer

BlueGene/L [Photo courtsey: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL)]

International Business Machines late Wednesday said it has been selected by the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration to design and build a next-generation supercomputer that could achieve a speed of up to 1,000 trillion calculations per second, or one petaflop. The DOE confirmed that Congress has provided $35 million in fiscal 2006 for the project.

The machine, codenamed "Roadrunner", could be four times more potent than the current fastest machine, BlueGene/L, also built by IBM [Read our report on Top500 supercomputers].

The DOE added that "Roadrunner" could be used for the NNSA's stockpile stewardship program, which helps ensure that the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile is safe and reliable without the resumption of underground nuclear testing.

The new computer is a "hybrid" design, using both conventional supercomputer processors and the new "cell" chip designed for Sony's PlayStation 3. The machine is to be built entirely from commercially available hardware and based on the Red Hat Linux Version 4.3 operating system. IBM System x 3755 systems based on AMD Opteron technology will be deployed in conjunction with IBM BladeCenter H systems with Cell technology. IBM will begin shipping the new supercomputer to the DOE facility at Los Alamos later this year, with completion of the installation and acceptance anticipated in 2008. It will cover 12,000 square feet (1,100 square metres) of floor space there.