Comments on: Goethe University building a GPU cluster, but not how you think [UPDATED] http://insidehpc.com/2010/07/02/goethe-university-building-a-gpu-cluster-but-not-how-you-think/ HPC News Without the Noise for Supercomputing Professionals | insideHPC Sun, 09 Jun 2013 01:54:13 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.1 By: John West http://insidehpc.com/2010/07/02/goethe-university-building-a-gpu-cluster-but-not-how-you-think/#comment-238455 John West Tue, 13 Jul 2010 21:36:22 +0000 http://insidehpc.com/?p=12432#comment-238455 Update back from John Fruehe at AMD. Turns out that these are indeed 2U, not 1U servers as the post originally indicated, and that the rack count was wrong. John has updated his post, and the corrected text reads as follows: "To help bring the whole set of servers together into a cohesive cluster, Bright Cluster Manager(tm) software will be utilized and Mellanox quad data rate InfiniBand will serve as the interconnect between the nodes. To help maximize data center space, the cluster will be built on a SuperMicro "twin" platforms that provide 2 motherboards in a 2U rack server chassis. This allows the 772 total motherboards to be located in 386 physical servers. To give you an idea of the size of this cluster, 386 2U servers will fit in about 18 42U racks if you were to put in only the servers (and no networking equipment.)" I've also updated this blog post to reflect the change. AMD was very appreciative that our readers are so on the ball, as am I. Update back from John Fruehe at AMD. Turns out that these are indeed 2U, not 1U servers as the post originally indicated, and that the rack count was wrong. John has updated his post, and the corrected text reads as follows:

“To help bring the whole set of servers together into a cohesive cluster, Bright Cluster Manager(tm) software will be utilized and Mellanox quad data rate InfiniBand will serve as the interconnect between the nodes. To help maximize data center space, the cluster will be built on a SuperMicro “twin” platforms that provide 2 motherboards in a 2U rack server chassis. This allows the 772 total motherboards to be located in 386 physical servers. To give you an idea of the size of this cluster, 386 2U servers will fit in about 18 42U racks if you were to put in only the servers (and no networking equipment.)”

I’ve also updated this blog post to reflect the change. AMD was very appreciative that our readers are so on the ball, as am I.

]]> By: swanny http://insidehpc.com/2010/07/02/goethe-university-building-a-gpu-cluster-but-not-how-you-think/#comment-237524 swanny Thu, 08 Jul 2010 22:40:31 +0000 http://insidehpc.com/?p=12432#comment-237524 This is all OLD news anyway. The press release is date 1-June 2010. This is all OLD news anyway. The press release is date 1-June 2010.

]]> By: swanny http://insidehpc.com/2010/07/02/goethe-university-building-a-gpu-cluster-but-not-how-you-think/#comment-237523 swanny Thu, 08 Jul 2010 22:39:01 +0000 http://insidehpc.com/?p=12432#comment-237523 wow...two minutes of my own research and here is what I found. FIrst off, the cluster deal was won by Clustervision. Their own press release here: http://www.clustervision.com/pr_frankfurt_uk.php Here is what the press release says in part: "The supercomputer will be built by ClusterVision using Bright Cluster Manager™ as the cluster management software, which is unique due to its built-in functionality for large and complex HPC clusters. At the heart of the cluster will be 386 units of 2U Supermicro GPU-optimised Twin servers with two hot-plug nodes each, 1544 AMD Opteron 12-core "Magny-Cours" CPUs, 772 ATI Radeon GPGPUs, and QDR Mellanox InfiniBand. The supercomputer will also have 420 TeraBytes of disk storage from Dell with an extremely fast, 10GB/s, parallel FhGFS filesystem from the Fraunhofer Institute ITWM in Kaiserslautern." Too bad the AMD guy can't seem to cut and paste like I can.....:) geez...... wow…two minutes of my own research and here is what I found. FIrst off, the cluster deal was won by Clustervision. Their own press release here:
http://www.clustervision.com/pr_frankfurt_uk.php
Here is what the press release says in part:
“The supercomputer will be built by ClusterVision using Bright Cluster Manager™ as the cluster management software, which is unique due to its built-in functionality for large and complex HPC clusters. At the heart of the cluster will be 386 units of 2U Supermicro GPU-optimised Twin servers with two hot-plug nodes each, 1544 AMD Opteron 12-core “Magny-Cours” CPUs, 772 ATI Radeon GPGPUs, and QDR Mellanox InfiniBand. The supercomputer will also have 420 TeraBytes of disk storage from Dell with an extremely fast, 10GB/s, parallel FhGFS filesystem from the Fraunhofer Institute ITWM in Kaiserslautern.”
Too bad the AMD guy can’t seem to cut and paste like I can…..:)
geez……

]]> By: John West http://insidehpc.com/2010/07/02/goethe-university-building-a-gpu-cluster-but-not-how-you-think/#comment-237241 John West Wed, 07 Jul 2010 15:10:43 +0000 http://insidehpc.com/?p=12432#comment-237241 swanny - your comments are on AMD's blog post, so I've asked them to provide some clarifying details. I'll post back when I hear from them. swanny – your comments are on AMD’s blog post, so I’ve asked them to provide some clarifying details. I’ll post back when I hear from them.

]]> By: swanny http://insidehpc.com/2010/07/02/goethe-university-building-a-gpu-cluster-but-not-how-you-think/#comment-237044 swanny Tue, 06 Jul 2010 17:36:12 +0000 http://insidehpc.com/?p=12432#comment-237044 So let me get this right. 1U server with two dual socket motherboards and then a GPU for each of those nodes? All in a 1U? Not only does Supermicro not make a 1U Twin AMD platform, they don't make a twin AMD platform with room for two GPU's either. At least they have not publicly stated these platforms and as of right now, this info is not on their site. And then there is this comment: "386 1U servers will fit in almost five (5) twin 42U racks if you were to put in only the servers" What? This statement doesn't even make sense. What is a twin 42U rack anyway? An 84U rack? 5 42U racks equals 210 available U's, if you will. And no, 386 1U servers don't fit in 210 U's. Who posts this stuff anyway? So let me get this right. 1U server with two dual socket motherboards and then a GPU for each of those nodes? All in a 1U? Not only does Supermicro not make a 1U Twin AMD platform, they don’t make a twin AMD platform with room for two GPU’s either. At least they have not publicly stated these platforms and as of right now, this info is not on their site.
And then there is this comment:
“386 1U servers will fit in almost five (5) twin 42U racks if you were to put in only the servers”
What? This statement doesn’t even make sense. What is a twin 42U rack anyway? An 84U rack? 5 42U racks equals 210 available U’s, if you will. And no, 386 1U servers don’t fit in 210 U’s. Who posts this stuff anyway?

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