ACADEMIA

Cray today announced that Rice University in Houston, Texas, has chosen the Cray XD1 supercomputer to power its new research computing system. The 28-chassis machine is the largest Cray XD1 system purchased to date. Equipped with 336 Dual-Core AMD Opteron processors (672 cores), the supercomputer will be used by Rice researchers for studies that include computer science, biophysics, computational mathematics, earth sciences and cognitive neuroscience. Cray XD1 supercomputers are designed to take advantage of Dual-Core AMD Opteron processors. With two processor cores on a single die, the dual-core devices boost performance without requiring as much power, cooling or space as two single-core processors. In addition, Rice University will equip its Cray XD1 supercomputer with field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) to allow their researchers to explore possibilities for accelerating applications using reconfigurable computing techniques. "Rice's research community is growing rapidly, and the users have demanded a system that will provide the processing power required to support a diverse set of compute-intensive challenges across both science and engineering," said Jan Odegard, executive director of Rice's Computer and Information Technology Institute (CITI). "After performing extensive application benchmarks, we chose the Cray XD1 supercomputer with Dual-Core AMD Opteron processors because it significantly outperformed competing systems when running several key applications." "The Cray XD1 system will also significantly reduce our total cost of operation due to its higher density, superior heat dissipation and lower power consumption," Odegard said. "The standards-based Linux operating system allows us to provide a common hardware and software platform that enables collaboration and resource sharing among our various research groups, resulting in greater efficiency and economy." The acquisition of the supercomputer was funded by a $2 million federal grant, one of the largest awarded under the National Science Foundation's Major Research Infrastructure program. The system will initially support 32 faculty investigators and 150 graduate and undergraduate students. CITI anticipates the supercomputer will eventually benefit any Rice faculty member whose research depends on large-scale computing. Projects currently scheduled to run on the system include models of flows in implanted blood pumps, studies of thermal convection in the Earth's mantle and computer-aided drug discovery. The Cray XD1 supercomputer leverages Direct Connect Architecture, the AMD Opteron HyperTransport technology and innovative memory controller features to provide high-bandwidth, low-latency links between processors and memory. This high-speed interconnect significantly accelerates applications, allowing users to tackle larger problems and solve them more quickly. "We're excited that Rice University has selected the Cray XD1 supercomputer as the centerpiece for its research computing program," said Peter Ungaro, president and chief executive officer of Cray. "Rice has an excellent reputation around the world, and we are energized by the opportunity to build our largest Cray XD1 supercomputer for their very demanding scientific applications. We believe it provides further proof of the value of Cray's innovative research and development in providing some of the world's most advanced computing systems." "We designed Dual-Core AMD Opteron processors to help our customers realize more computing power and efficiency," said Ben Williams, vice president of commercial business at AMD. "Cray's XD1 supercomputer takes full advantage of AMD's true dual-core technology and Direct Connect Architecture, providing customers with systems that excel at some of the most demanding applications in use today."