ENGINEERING

A Dell supercomputing cluster at The University of Illinois' National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) was recognized today as the world's fourth fastest supercomputer, according to the bi-annual Top 500 list (www.top500.org). The Top 500 List has emerged as the defacto source to determine the fastest supercomputers based on a benchmark that measures a system's sustained performance. The total number of Dell entries on the list has increased to 18, reflecting the growing trend toward standards-based systems configured in high-performance computing clusters (HPCC) to address sophisticated computing needs in academia, laboratories and commercial organizations. "NCSA's achievement marks an important milestone for Dell and the industry -- proving again that practically every area of computing can benefit from the performance and price of standards-based computing," said Jeff Clarke, senior vice president and general manager of Dell's Product Group. "We'll continue to simplify and standardize technologies associated with HPCC to help make it more affordable and accessible to customers." The 2,500 processor cluster at NCSA is being used to study the evolution, size and structure of the universe, investigating theories on the lifecycle of stars like the Sun, modeling severe storms, studying the human genome and biological processes, advancing the drug design process and more. Redefining the Computing Elite Dell's ongoing innovation and standardization efforts for HPCC have been key drivers in expanding the company's presence on the Top 500 List (www.top500.org) of the world's fastest supercomputers. Dell is the leading provider of Intel-based Linux technical clusters with 36.3 percent share worldwide, according to second quarter 2003 data from IDC.(a) Clustered Intel-based systems now account for 37.8 percent of the list, up 14 percent in the six months since the list was last published. Dell's 18 entries have a cumulative performance of 27.2 trillion floating-point operations per second (TFLOPS), more than double the 10.677 TFLOPS in the previous list. Eight Dell entries achieved performance of greater then a TFLOP. The cluster at the University of Illinois is the highest-ranking Dell and the highest-ranking Intel-based system at No. 4 with 9.819 TFLOPS performance. Other ranked Dell clusters include: Texas Advanced Computing Center/University of Texas (25), University at Buffalo, State University of New York (37), Sandia National Labs (67), Cornell Theory Center (68), University of Liverpool (86), Australian Centre for Advanced Computing and Communications (108), Compagnie Generale de Geophysique (112), Penn State University (142), Sandia National Labs (143), Penn State University (154), Dell (176), Boeing (225), University of Utah (248), University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (260), Center for Theoretical Biological Physics, University of California, San Diego (408), Gessellschaft fuer wissenschaftliche Datenverarbeitung (490) and MTU Aero Engine (500). For more information on the Dell HPCC program, please visit: www.dell.com/hpcc.