
Argonne National Laboratory awards Cray contract for 180 Petaflops supercomputer - davidmr
http://investors.cray.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=98390&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=2033626
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ericHosick
To put this in perspective, as of 11/2014, the aggregated computing power of
the top 500 supercomputers is 308.9 Petaflops
([http://www.top500.org/](http://www.top500.org/)).

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davidmr
Having worked at ANL in the past on other supercomputers, this is an
especially impressive and interesting contract. 180PF, even in 2018 is by any
definition an absolute monster of a system.

It's also very interesting that the contract was awarded to Cray and not to
IBM. ANL's first two supers, Intrepid and Mira, are both IBM Blue Genes.

This must be a very exciting day for ANL and Cray. Congrats!

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filereaper
Both Cray and IBM were in the competition for the next supercomputers for:

\- Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL)

\- Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL)

\- Argonne National Naboratory (ANL)

IBM won LLNL and ORNL to create the upcoming Sierra and Summit Supercomputers.
We heard down the grapevine that ANL wanted an IBM based system as well, but
due to the rules of the competition they were given the Cray system.

So the rumour goes anyways, I'm not in the inner circle.

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davidmr
That doesn't surprise me at all. The DOE keeps more options open by selecting
different vendors for the same generation installs. In the last generation,
LLNL and ANL were IBM and ORNL was the Cray.

That said, I'm long since out of whatever circle it was that I was in
(certainly not the inner one!) as well so I speak with no authority
whatsoever.

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batbomb
NERSC just put Hopper, a cray xe6, online for general use last year. It clocks
in at only 1.3 petaflops.

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jedbrown
This title is incorrect. Intel is the prime contractor (for the first time
since ASCI Red) and Cray is the subcontractor. [http://energy.gov/articles/us-
department-energy-awards-200-m...](http://energy.gov/articles/us-department-
energy-awards-200-million-next-generation-supercomputer-argonne-national)

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niels_olson
For some reason, I don't think it's coincidence that Guangzhou Supercomputer
Center got put on the US Technology “Denial List” and Argonne awarded Cray a
180 Petaflop sale.

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davidmr
The DOE announced the awards for ORNL and LLNL last November, and there wasn't
a similar announcement about then, I don't see why today's is any more
relevant.

That said, I doubt it comes as a surprise to the Chinese government, but it's
kind of an ironic stick in the eye given what the DOE's mission is (and what
the supercomputer at LLNL is used for). I suppose I don't blame the US
government as I'm guessing the law prevents US companies from exporting
devices used for nuclear weapons, but it's definitely a dick move.

~~~
stox
Currently, there is only one thing the Chinese supercomputers are good at.
Running Linpack. Give it time, and the Chinese will build up the library and
experience to fully take advantage of the resource. In the mean time, we're
not going to help them much.

The single biggest consumer of Supercomputing cycles is the DOE for
Fusion^H^H^H^H^HSuperNova simulations. They'll chew this up in no time. At
least this is being located at the LCF, so it will be open to all sorts of
academic usage, too.

[ added ] Teach me not to read the news earlier. Not a bright move, cutting
off the Chinese from Xeons and the like will only drive them to develop all
the tech themselves. While I do not believe we should be handing them tech on
a silver platter, it is actually worse to cut them off.

