Compaq, Gov't To Make Supercomputer
04:21 PM ET 08/03/00
HOUSTON (AP) - Compaq Computer Corp., in conjunction with the
Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center, was selected Thursday by the
government to build and manage the world's largest nonmilitary
supercomputer.
The PSC will manage the $36 million project for the National
Science Foundation, based in Arlington, Va. The computer will be
based on Houston-based Compaq's AlphaServer SC, the company said. A total of 2,728 processors will allow the computer to perform
more than 6 trillion operations per second.
The system will allow the federal science foundation to
establish a single high-powered resource for research in fields as
varied as drugs, weather forecasting and modeling of earthquakes. ``I am pleased that the National Science Foundation is expanding
its investment in supercomputing systems capable of making
trillions of calculations per second,'' President Clinton said.
``This investment will accelerate the pace of discovery in science
and engineering _ allowing us to better predict tornadoes, speed up
the discovery of life-saving drugs and design more fuel-efficient
engines.''
A smaller Compaq AlphaServer was used by Celera Genomics Group
to help the company successfully map the human genome.
The fastest supercomputer in the world was made by IBM.
The computer, called Advanced Strategic Computing Initiative
White, or ASCI White, covers 9,920 square feet of floor space,
equal to two NBA basketball courts, and weighs 106 tons. It is
capable of performing 12.3 trillion operations per second and was
built for the Energy Department's Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory.
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