Supercomputer On the Cheap

jbrodkin writes "You don't need Ivy League-type cash to get a supercomputer anymore. Organizations with limited financial resources are snatching up IBM supercomputers now that Big Blue has lowered the price of Blue Gene/L. Alabama-Birmingham and other universities that previously couldn't afford such advanced technology are using supercomputers to cure diseases at the protein level and to solve equally challenging problems. IBM dropped the price of the Blue Gene/L to $800K late last year before releasing a more powerful model, Blue Gene/P, last month. Sales of Blue Gene/L have more than doubled since then, bringing supercomputing into more corners of the academic and research worlds."

From TFA

[DaveCar]

At its highest price, the Blue Gene/L cost $1.3 million per rack

Pamela Anderson eat your heart out!

Re:Try this!!!!

[DaveCar]

<moe>Listen to me, you little puke. One of these days, I'm going to catch you, and I'm going to carve my name on your back with an ice pick!</moe>

Beowulf!

[rgravina]

Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these!

Re:From TFA

[IBBoard]

And knowing most super computers, both would be far too large, ugly, and filled with silicon.

Re:"Supercomputer"

[cerberusss]

i think my PS2 is supercomputer isnt it?

Hah! These old and heavy IBM PS/2's are deadly weapons once loaded into my bolt thrower. Imagine using Blue Gene and my goal of World Domination is coming nearer.

Re:From TFA

[mwvdlee]

On the plus side; most supercomputers are fully hot swappable, try doing that with women.

Re:Obligatory

[Tap13579]

Will it blend? That is the question.

I'm the laughing gnome, you can't catch me

[Dogtanian]

At its highest price, the Blue Gene/L cost $1.3 million per rack

Pamela Anderson eat your heart out!

my rack is bigger than yours it brings the researchers to the yard i could teach you but i'd have to charge... *dances*

I hear that David Bowie has a thing for Blue Gene computers:

"Blue Jean^wGene, I just met a supercomputer named Blue Gene
Blue Gene, She got a camouflaged face and no money"
Remember, they always let you down when you need `em"

(Guess IBM's reliability sucks, then...)

"Oh Blue Gene
Is heaven any sweeter than Blue Gene?
She got a one-petaflop 294,912-processor, 72-rack system configuration harnessed to a high-speed, optical network,
She got a turned up nose..."

Re:From TFA

[Gazzonyx]

On the plus side; most supercomputers are fully hot swappable, try doing that with women.

My experience says the hotswap turns to a dual cold shoulder; It has something to do with an error when malloc fails to make sufficient room to store correct name, or a null pointer is dereferenced when trying to remember name. Oh well. There's still hope.

while(1)
{
myGirl = myGirl -> cuteFriend;
delete myGirl -> last;
}
myGirl -> isHappyEnding = !(myGirl -> isHappyEnding);

JUST IN TIME!!

[armodude]

FOR RUNNING VISTA the way it was meant to be run!!!

That's nothing....

[E++99]

If $800,000 is still too pricey for you, you can get a Cray supercomputer on eBay for $800:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Cray-J90-Supercomputer-1-CPU-2 -Memory-Modules-J-90_W0QQitemZ8816248638QQihZ014QQ categoryZ162QQrdZ1QQssPageNameZWD1VQQcmdZViewItem [ebay.com]

Re:For what? Supercomputers do only one job

[blake3737]

They are fast racecars which cannot race outside of circuit.
Are you trying to tell me I can take my Mainframe offroading? If I do this, can YOU be the one to tell my admin why his precious is covered in mud and burned clutch smell?

Re:From TFA

[suggsjc]

It appears that you have some problems with your logic as you will just stay in that while loop indefinitely (yeah right). Here is the updated code, and man is it complicated! But if you learn one thing from this, its that it only gets more expensive...

// initialize variables
myGirl = arg[0];
acctbal = arg[1];
girl_count = 1;

while (!screwed) {
date_cost = 20;
while (!bored && !dumped) {
date_success = date(date_cost);

if (date_success) { date_cost = date_cost * 1.75; }
else { dumped = true; }

bonus = will_have_sex() ? 1000 : 0;
attractiveness = (myGirl->personality * myGirl->hotness^2) + bonus / (date_cost * this->fear_of_commitment);

if (attractiveness < 1) { bored = true; }
}
myGirl = myGirl -> cuteFriend;
delete myGirl -> last;

if (date_cost ^ girl_count < acctbal ) {
screwed = true;
}
girl_count++;
}

function date(cost) {
if (cost > acctbal) {
return false;
}
else {
acctbal = acctbal - cost;
return true;
}
}

function will_have_sex {
if (acctbal > 1000000 || date_cost > 250) { return true; }
else { return false; }
}