From Stanford
What are GPU's and how can they help FAH? GPU's are Graphics Processing Units -- chips used in today's PC's to help speed high performance graphics, such as 3D games or 3D scientific visualization. GPUs have the possibility to perform an enormous number of Floating Point OPerations (FLOPs). However, they achieve this high performance by losing generality -- there are only certain types of calculations which would be well-suited to GPUs. However, after much work, we have been able to write a highly optimized molecular dynamics code for GPU's, achieving a 20x to 40x speed increase over comparable CPU code for certain types of calculations in FAH. This means that we will be able to make an enormous advance over what we could do only just a few years ago.
ATI here I come (Dell XPS 400) comes to mind
PS3
Now in 2006, we are looking forward to another major advance in capabilities. This advance utilizes the new Cell processor in Sony's PLAYSTATION 3 <http://www.us.playstation.com/PS3>(PS3) to achieve performance previously only possible on supercomputers. With this new technology (as well as new advances with GPUs <http://folding.stanford.edu/FAQ-highperformance.html>), we will likely be able to attain performance on the 100 gigaflop scale per computer. With about 10,000 such machines, we would be able to achieve performance on the petaflop scale <http://folding.stanford.edu/FAQ-FPI.html>. With software from Sony, the PlayStation 3 will now be able to contribute to the Folding@Home project, pushing Folding@Home a major step forward.
PS3 here I come
This really means that we as a team really need to think about how we view future hardware purchases. When a $500 - 600 purchase gets this type of power, especially
The upcoming PS3, we could collectively become our own supercomputer not that
We're not already supercomputers
Just my thoughts.
What are GPU's and how can they help FAH? GPU's are Graphics Processing Units -- chips used in today's PC's to help speed high performance graphics, such as 3D games or 3D scientific visualization. GPUs have the possibility to perform an enormous number of Floating Point OPerations (FLOPs). However, they achieve this high performance by losing generality -- there are only certain types of calculations which would be well-suited to GPUs. However, after much work, we have been able to write a highly optimized molecular dynamics code for GPU's, achieving a 20x to 40x speed increase over comparable CPU code for certain types of calculations in FAH. This means that we will be able to make an enormous advance over what we could do only just a few years ago.
ATI here I come (Dell XPS 400) comes to mind
PS3
Now in 2006, we are looking forward to another major advance in capabilities. This advance utilizes the new Cell processor in Sony's PLAYSTATION 3 <http://www.us.playstation.com/PS3>(PS3) to achieve performance previously only possible on supercomputers. With this new technology (as well as new advances with GPUs <http://folding.stanford.edu/FAQ-highperformance.html>), we will likely be able to attain performance on the 100 gigaflop scale per computer. With about 10,000 such machines, we would be able to achieve performance on the petaflop scale <http://folding.stanford.edu/FAQ-FPI.html>. With software from Sony, the PlayStation 3 will now be able to contribute to the Folding@Home project, pushing Folding@Home a major step forward.
PS3 here I come
This really means that we as a team really need to think about how we view future hardware purchases. When a $500 - 600 purchase gets this type of power, especially
The upcoming PS3, we could collectively become our own supercomputer not that
We're not already supercomputers
Just my thoughts.