buzzcutbuddha writes "Linux PR has a press release about a new weather forecasting supercomputer running Linux built by High Performance Technologies, Inc. that will be unveiled on Wednesday by NOAA. There is even a phone number to call to tour the High Performance Computer Center. " (let's see if the trolls can be clever for a change ;) Anyhoo 276 nodes, but its costed $15M? Them must be some spendy nodes...

Linux is always a little bigger than you think. Every day, people are working on porting Linux to new platforms to achieve more with what they have. In the case of LinuxPPC and Terra Soft Solutions, they're working with community spirit and the PowerPC architecture to create insanely great solutions with a touch of Tux.

Professor Pollack put a lot of time and thought into answering your questions, and it shows. What follows is a "deeper than we expected" series of comments about Artificial Intelligence and intellectual property distribution from one of the acknowledged leaders in both fields.

ncmusic asks: "As seen in this story, whatever became of Starbridge and their cheap supercomputers? Was it all an elaborate hoax?" As far as I can tell, they are still around, but can anyone more familiar with them give us a heads-up on their progress?

In the new paperback edition of his book, Paul Davies takes us on a wonderful tour (metaphorically) through what he calls the "Mind of God." Physics may scare some people, but physicists like Davies (and Dyson and Walker) are doing some of the best writing on the planet on spirituality, science, and the powerful connection between the two. This paperback is a hypnotic exploration of some of the great questions of existence as well as a lively summary of recent developments in theoretical physics. Read more.

DocRea writes: "Using Linux, IBM and the University of New Mexico will connect 256 two-processor IBM Intel-based servers with high-speed Myrinet cards to create a 512-processor machine capable of 375 billion calculations per second. The computer, called Los Lobos, will primarily be used for scientific purposes, but will be adapted by IBM to provide the "cluster" approach to running software for business tasks and e- commerce. "

shawnb writes "It seems that IBM has created the world's fastest Linux cluster built from lots of small servers (64 IBM Netfinity 256 servers). The Netfinity servers are linked together using "special clustering software and high-speed networking hardware, which causes the separate units to act as one computer, delivering a processing speed of 375 gigaflops, or 375 billion operations per second." They also go on to say that this is the fastest Linux supercomputer, "it will only rank 24th on the list of the top 500 fastest supercomputers. " "

kfarmer@tru64.org writes, "The French Atomic Energy Commission has placed an order for a supercomputer to simulate and analyze nuclear explosions. The supercomputer will use about 2,000 Alpha chips running in the 1.25-GHz range, or about 2,500 chips at the 1-GHz level."

Brian writes "CNN Online has a story on a company that has introduced supercomputers for under $100,000 and they hope to have four-layer supercomputers for under $4,000 before long. The computers use AMD processors and according to the company's Web site, they come running Linux. I can't wait to add one of these to my collection!" As always, we've heard about Patmos before. Check out an older story here.

RuntimeError writes "It says here in Times of India that a gentleman in Bangalore, India has created the country's first commercial supercomputer based on the Linux operating system."

Narf Narf writes "From the New York Times, an article a five-year, $100 million program to build a supercomputer whose purpose is to simulate protein folding and acheive one petaflop. Free registration required. "

jfinke sent in a link - as did many others - to a brief Yahoo News story about SGI's plans to move into the parallel processing supercomputer marketplace with Linux as their base OS. "We're really pumped up about it," said Beau Vrolyk, senior vice president of SGI's product group. "It represents the beginning of a whole new generation of supercomputer."

xinit was one of the people who pointed us to the CNET story running about the possibility that a current bid by SGI for a supercomputer could be run on Linux. The supercomputer could be the fastest in the world at time of its production. SGI has confirmed the bid, saying it's being targeted for 2001, if the bid is accepted. The placement would be Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Durinia writes "SGI has announced a few details on their next Cray vector supercomputer. The press release is mostly about them getting government support for the R&D. It does, however, mention that it will be combining the powerful Cray vector processors with SGI's ccNUMA architecture for big-time scalability."

Greg Lindahl writes "The Forecast Systems Laboratory, a divison of NOAA, selected HPTi, a Linux cluster integrator, to provide a $15 million supercomputing system during the next 5 years. The computational core of this system is a cluster of Compaq Alphas running Linux, using Myrinet interconnect. Check outwww.hpti.com for information on the company. "

Apple's G4, launched in a blizzard of savvy hype, heralds the second Age of Apple. Although this one is very different from the first (for one thing, Apple is a lot greedier), Apple's string of successes says a lot about the fact that individual creativity will beat out corporate marketers every single time.

Red Hat is now worth serious money. Exactly how much changes hour by hour. Check the Red Hat Wealth Monitor for up-to-date information. This page is by no means anti-Red Hat, and it has a bunch of commentary on it that's well worth reading. We also got some excellent comments about the Red Hat IPO from professional investors Jay Roseman and Frederick Berenstein of The Linux Fund, and a perceptive note from "an anonymous insider" (he'd lose his job if we published his name) that may help put Red Hat's IPO in perspective -- and serve as a cautionary tale for other Linux and/or Open Source-related companies that decide to sell stock to the public. (Lots more below.)

anaZ writes " SGI today announced that it will install the company's first 128-processor Linux(R) cluster at the Ohio Supercomputer Center." It seems SGI will be using 32 Quad Xeon boxes (1400L). I wonder (and hope!) it is just the first of many.

Colin Guillas writes "As we know, a single user posing as using a Russian supercomputer has been cracking distributed.net keys in the gigakeys range... but it turns out to be a hoax, as stated by nugget himself. Also, there are clues to the identity of this cracker, as written by Maxxim Kochegarov at this site . "

Sean Mooney writes "CNN is reporting that $1000 pc that is 60,000 times faster than a PII 350 may be on the market within 18 months. Star Bridge Systems is making the field programmable gate array (FPGA) computer. These are the same guys who are making HAL, reported earlier. " I'll believe that when I see it. Although I can't think of a better way to break Moore's Law.