Comments on: A Rare Perspective on Chinese Supercomputing http://insidehpc.com/2011/12/30/a-rare-perspective-on-chinese-supercomputing/ HPC News Without the Noise for Supercomputing Professionals | insideHPC Sun, 19 May 2013 10:46:54 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.1 By: markhahn http://insidehpc.com/2011/12/30/a-rare-perspective-on-chinese-supercomputing/#comment-375909 markhahn Mon, 09 Jan 2012 22:54:21 +0000 http://insidehpc.com/?p=26225#comment-375909 instead of yet another "China can put together off-the-shelf parts to get a world-class cluster, and it can run all sorts of simulations" article, can SOMEONE find out something about what makes these computers interesting? for instance, any novel cooling mechanisms? any special tweaks to MPI, scheduling, libraries? didn't Tianhe-1a have a unique network, rather than just another IB fabric? does the "domestic processor"-based Sunway Blue Light actually use processors that are wholly domestic, or (I'm guessing) just another licensed ARM core? do these various Chinese computers typically run the same old software stacks that you see everywhere else (linux, mpich/openmpi, scheduler, etc)? I can understand why trumpet-blowing is politically important, even if "supercomputers" are wholly off-the-shelf these days. but that noise doesn't have to completely drown out potentially interesting technical advances. instead of yet another “China can put together off-the-shelf parts to get a world-class cluster, and it can run all sorts of simulations” article, can SOMEONE find out something about what makes these computers interesting? for instance, any novel cooling mechanisms? any special tweaks to MPI, scheduling, libraries? didn’t Tianhe-1a have a unique network, rather than just another IB fabric? does the “domestic processor”-based Sunway Blue Light actually use processors that are wholly domestic, or (I’m guessing) just another licensed ARM core? do these various Chinese computers typically run the same old software stacks that you see everywhere else (linux, mpich/openmpi, scheduler, etc)?

I can understand why trumpet-blowing is politically important, even if “supercomputers” are wholly off-the-shelf these days. but that noise doesn’t have to completely drown out potentially interesting technical advances.

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