Ever
wondered which are the most powerful supercomputers of all time?
Supercomputers which with their supersonic speed broke various computing
barriers and also brought in revolution in varied fields like nuclear
science, medicine, environment and weather. The computing power of these computers is way beyond your imagination.
So here I have compiled some of the most powerful computer in the world. I hope you will like it.
So here I have compiled some of the most powerful computer in the world. I hope you will like it.
A new
ADDITION >> China has recentrly taken top spot by China’s
Tianhe-1A (Milky Way) to be the fast computer in the world. Details can
be seen on BBCNews
Cray-1
Cray-1 was
the world’s fastest machine that was installed at Los Alamos National
Laboratory in 1976. Cray-1 boasted a speed of 160 million floating-point
operations per second. The first model of the Cray-1 (Cray-1A) weighed
5.5 tons.
Cray-2
Launched in
1985, the machine held the title of the world’s fastest supercomputer
between 1985-1989. Cray-2 was capable of 1.9 gigaflops peak
performance. Cray-2 was predominantly developed for the United States
Departments of Defense and Energy. Due to the use of liquid cooling, it
was nicknamed `Bubbles’.
Connection Machine-5 (CM-5)
Launched in
1991, Connection Machine-5 (CM-5) held the crown for the world’s fastest
supercomputer in 1992. The machine intended for artificial intelligence
applications and symbolic processing found remarkable success in the
field of computational science.
Fujitsu Numerical Wind Tunnel
Fujitsu Numerical Wind Tunnel
Known as the
Numerical Wind Tunnel, the machine was built by Fujitsu and Japan’s
National Aerospace Laboratory. The machine was used to simulate wind
turbulence on airplanes and in spacecraft as well as to forecast
weather.
ASCI Red
The fastest
computer from June 1997 to June 2000, ASCI Red was collaboration between
Intel Corp and Sandia Labs. It was the first computer to break the
teraflops barrier, which after the processor upgrade passed 2 teraflops.
ASCI White
ASCI White,
an IBM system, replaced ASCI-Red as the fastest supercomputer in 2000.
ASCI White held the spot for world’s fastest supercomputer for two years
from 2000-2002. It was capable of computing 12.3 trillion operations
per second.
The Earth Simulator
Built by NEC
for the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, the Japan Atomic Energy
Research Institute and the Japan Marina Science and Technology Center,
the Earth Simulator (ES) was the fastest supercomputer in the world from
2002 to 2004.
Blue Gene/L
Currently
the seventh fastest supercomputer in the world, IBM BlueGene/L held the
title of world’s fastest supercomputer for four years from 2004 to
2008. The supercomputer is located at Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory’s. BlueGene/L (BGL) clocked 478.2 trillion floating
operations per second.
IBM Roadrunner
IBM
Roadrunner was crowned No. 1 in June 2008 after becoming the first
supercomputer to break one petaflop/s. IBM’s Roadrunner managed 1.042
petaflops. The supercomputer is located at the Los Alamos National
Laboratory.
Jaguar
The world’s
fastest supercomputer according to TOP500 supercomputer list of 2009 is
Cray XT5, also known as Jaguar. Jaguar bagged the No. 1 spot, beating
IBM’s Roadrunner, who held the top crown from 2008 to 2009. It can
perform more than 1 quadrillion calculations per second.
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