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posted by cmn32480 on Thursday November 17 2016, @11:47AM   Printer-friendly
from the becha-they-don't-run-systemd dept.

http://www.zdnet.com/article/almost-all-the-worlds-fastest-supercomputers-run-linux/

Other than systems running Linux, there are two Chinese supercomputers running IBM AIX, a Unix variant. This pair, tied at 386 and 387, may not be long for the list. That's because supercomputers are growing ever faster.

[...] When the first TOP500 supercomputer list was compiled in June 1993, Linux was just gathering steam. Since 1998 when it first appeared on the list, Linux has consistently dominated the top 10. Since June 2010, Linux has run 90 percent of the world's fastest computers.

Before Linux jumped ahead, Unix was supercomputing's top dog. Since 2003, the top operating system has flipped from being 96 percent Unix to being 96 percent Linux. By 2004, Linux had taken over the lead and has yet to surrender it.

By 2017, Linux may have eliminated all its competition.

[Continues...]

takyon: There are some new entrants to the top 10 of the TOP500 list:

The top of the list did receive a mild shakeup with two new systems in the top ten. The Cori supercomputer, a Cray XC40 system installed at Berkeley Lab's National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC), slipped into the number 5 slot with a Linpack rating of 14.0 petaflops. Right behind it at number 6 is the new Oakforest-PACS supercomputer, a Fujitsu PRIMERGY CX1640 M1 cluster, which recorded a Linpack mark of 13.6 petaflops. Oakforest-PACS is up and running at Japan's Joint Center for Advanced High Performance Computing (JCAHPC). Both machines owe their computing prowess to the Intel "Knights Landing" Xeon Phi 7250, a 68-core processor that delivers 3 peak teraflops of performance.

The addition of Cori and Oakforest-PACS pushed every system below them a couple of notches down, with the exception of Piz Daint, a Cray supercomputer installed at the Swiss National Supercomputing Centre (CSCS). It maintained its spot at number 8 as a result of a massive 3.5 petaflop upgrade, courtesy of newly installed NVIDIA P100 Tesla GPUs. Piz Daint also has the honor of being the second most energy-efficient supercomputer in the TOP500, with a rating of 7.45 gigaflops/watt. It is topped by NVIDIA's in-house DGX SATURNV system, the only other system on the list equipped with the new P100 GPUs. It is a 3.3-petaflop cluster of DGX-1 servers that delivers 9.46 gigaflops/watt. To offer some perspective here, the nominal goal for the first exascale systems is 50 gigaflops/watt.


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  • (Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Thursday November 17 2016, @01:53PM

    by LoRdTAW (3755) on Thursday November 17 2016, @01:53PM (#428098) Journal

    I'm thinking lawn mower man meets terminator à la Torvalds.

    I am the Alpha! I am the omega! I am the kernel!
    - Linus 'bow down before me, you scum' Torvalds

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