Upgradable Architecture Enables Two Cray Supercomputers to Surpass the 100 Teraflops Mark
Cray's XT-Based Systems Feature a Scalable, Upgradable Architecture to Meet Massive Computational Demands While Leveraging Custo
Jul. 10, 2007 12:50 PM
SEATTLE, WA -- (MARKET WIRE) -- 07/10/07 -- Global supercomputer leader Cray Inc. (NASDAQ: CRAY) today announced that two Cray supercomputers are now in an elite
group of systems that can perform computations at more than 100 teraflops
(100 trillion floating point operations per second), as measured by the
industry-standard TOP500 benchmark. The Cray systems, one installed at Oak
Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) and the other at Sandia National
Laboratories, are now two of the three fastest computers in the world.
They are built on a Cray XT(TM) infrastructure that enables Cray customers
to upgrade to increasingly higher performance levels, instead of forcing
them to invest in an entirely new system.
The Cray XT4(TM) supercomputer at the Department of Energy's ORNL,
nicknamed Jaguar, is the world's most powerful system dedicated to open
science. ORNL completed an upgrade to its existing Cray XT system earlier
this year that more than doubled its performance to over 100 teraflops.
When running the nuclear fusion application AORSA, the ORNL system achieved
an impressive 74 percent of the system's theoretical peak, an efficiency
level that usually can be attained only when performing "artificial"
benchmark tests. The system has at least one more major upgrade in its
future that will double its performance once again.
The Cray XT3(TM) supercomputer at Sandia, known as Red Storm, was developed
jointly by Cray and Sandia, a part of the Department of Energy's National
Nuclear Security Administration. The system operates in a dual network
environment that allows for both classified and unclassified work. Sandia
upgraded Red Storm late last year to three times its original performance
level, boosting its performance to more than 100 teraflops.
"We want to thank and congratulate both Oak Ridge and Sandia for their
achievement in reaching this impressive performance milestone," said Cray
President and CEO Peter Ungaro.
"Typical Linux clusters can't scale to these performance levels, especially
on real-world applications," continued Ungaro. "And other custom systems
are based on special microprocessors and packaging technologies that cannot
cost-effectively be upgraded to take advantage of new technologies. The
Cray XT design combines AMD Opteron(TM) processors and a custom Cray
SeaStar(TM) network to provide unparalleled scalability and upgradeability.
This allows our customers to leverage their investment in both hardware and
software by increasing the size and capabilities of their existing
supercomputers as the technology advances, rather than having to purchase a
new system. It's a big total cost of ownership (TCO) win for them. In
fact, perhaps the best proof point of this TCO advantage is that more than
75% of our XT customers have upgraded their initial Cray system."
About the Cray XT4 Supercomputer
Building on the success of the Cray XT3 system, the Cray XT4 is a massively
parallel processor supercomputer purpose-built to deliver exceptional
sustained application performance for challenging scientific and
engineering problems. The supercomputer's high-speed 3D torus interconnect,
advanced MPP operating system and high-speed global input/output make it
possible for users to scale applications from 200 to more than 30,000
processors without performance loss. The system's scalable processing
element uses x86 64-bit AMD Opteron single- or dual-core processors that
employ HyperTransport(TM) technology to increase bandwidth and reduce
latency. Go to www.cray.com/products/xt4/index.html for more information.
About Cray Inc.
As a global leader in supercomputing, Cray provides highly advanced
supercomputers and world-class services and support to government, industry
and academia. Cray technology enables scientists and engineers to achieve
remarkable breakthroughs by accelerating performance, improving efficiency
and extending the capabilities of their most demanding applications. Cray's
Adaptive Supercomputing vision will result in innovative next-generation
products that integrate diverse processing technologies into a unified
architecture, allowing customers to surpass today's limitations and meeting
the market's continued demand for realized performance. Go to www.cray.com
for more information.
Cray is a registered trademark, and Cray XT4, Cray XT, Cray XT3 and Cray
SeaStar are trademarks of Cray Inc. Opteron is a trademark of Advanced
Micro Devices, Inc. HyperTransport is a licensed trademark of the
HyperTransport Technology Consortium. All other trademarks are the property
of their respective owners.
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