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posted by Fnord666 on Thursday March 05 2020, @07:45PM   Printer-friendly
from the bigger,better,-faster dept.

El Capitan Supercomputer Detailed: AMD CPUs & GPUs To Drive 2 Exaflops of Compute

This afternoon the DOE and HPE are announcing the architectural details of the [El Capitan] supercomputer, revealing that AMD will be providing both the CPUs and accelerators (GPUs), as well as revising the performance estimate for the supercomputer. Already expected to be the fastest of the US's exascale systems, El Capitan was originally commissioned as a 1.5 exaflop system seven months ago. However thanks to some late configuration changes, the DOE now expects the system to reach 2 exaflops once it's fully installed, which would cement its place at the top of the US's supercomputer inventory.

Overall, El Capitan is the second (and apparently final) system being built as part of the US DOE's CORAL-2 program for supercomputers. Like the similar Frontier system, El Capitan comes with a $600 million price tag and is intended to ensure the US's leadership in supercomputers in the exascale era. LLNL will be using the system to replace Sierra, their current IBM Power 9 + NVIDIA Volta supercomputer. All told, El Capitan will be 16 times more powerful than the system it replaces. LLNL will be using it primary for nuclear weapons modeling – substituting for actual weapon testing – while the system will also see secondary use as a research system in other fields, particularly those where machine learning can be applied.

[...] On the CPU side of matters, AMD will be supplying a standard version of their Zen 4-based "Genoa" EPYC processor. As it's still two generations out from AMD's current wares, the amount of information on Zen 4/Genoa is limited, but AMD is promising support for next-generation memory, Infinity Fabric 3, as well as broad promises of both single and multi-threaded performance leadership. Notably, this is a greater level of detail on the CPU than we currently have for Frontier, which is using an unspecified and customized next-generation EPYC CPU.

See also: AMD's CPU-to-GPU Infinity Fabric Detailed

Also at Wccftech.

Previously:
Cray and AMD Will Build a 1.5 Exaflops Supercomputer by 2021

June 2019 TOP500 List: All 500 Systems Above 1 Petaflops


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  • (Score: 2) by ikanreed on Thursday March 05 2020, @09:34PM (3 children)

    by ikanreed (3164) Subscriber Badge on Thursday March 05 2020, @09:34PM (#967106) Journal

    You know, you go back 100 years, you might genuinely find some instances of that not being true.

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  • (Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday March 06 2020, @04:49PM (2 children)

    by Freeman (732) on Friday March 06 2020, @04:49PM (#967508) Journal

    Wait, such as TNT? Muzzle load rifles? What are you getting at? How about Gatling Guns? Grapeshot / Chain shot? Cannons in general? Arsenic? Bio Warfare? Mustard Gas? I'm confused as to what you're trying to get at?

    Are you implying that there were never or that there were some instances of mutual exclusivity?

    The fact is that there are examples of technology that was strictly developed for warfare and really isn't useful for anything else. I would say throughout history there are many examples of that. Then again, those might be able to be justified as deviations from the norm that is the progression of technology. Sure, Mustard Gas was a horrible thing as are nerve agents, etc. Yet, those were made possible by the increase in knowledge of how our world works and the progression of technology.

    Raise your hand, if you want to go back to a world without Air Conditioning, Running Water, Indoor Plumbing, Refrigerators, etc. There's nothing stopping you from living your dream. You might have to be bothered by the occasional airplane flying overhead or the like, though.

    --
    Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
    • (Score: 2) by ikanreed on Friday March 06 2020, @05:01PM (1 child)

      by ikanreed (3164) Subscriber Badge on Friday March 06 2020, @05:01PM (#967521) Journal

      That we were using those horrible weapons for necessary survival against hostile powers, instead of getting some dumb rich fucks a little richer or feeling threatened by Asian peasants overthrowing their dictatorship.

      • (Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday March 06 2020, @06:32PM

        by Freeman (732) on Friday March 06 2020, @06:32PM (#967572) Journal

        Yeah, no we've always done that. The USA has just been slightly less worse than those before it. Then again, maybe more of a different story same tune. Due to the ease of access to information is why you're hearing about all the troubles and all the little nuances about Kim Kardashian's latest outfit. The information age has made the world much smaller. Newspapers / News Stations / Media are just like they always have been, trying to make a buck. Sure, some news sources were better than others, but sex, politics, death, etc. sells papers. You won't sell all that many newspapers, if you're reporting on all the good, happy things that happened in the world today. Yay, grandma didn't get run over by a Raindeer . . .

        --
        Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"