IBM continues TOP500 lead

For a record-setting tenth consecutive time, an IBM (NYSE: IBM) system holds the number one position in the ranking of the world's most powerful supercomputers. The IBM computer built for the "roadrunner project" at Los Alamos National Lab – the first in the world to operate at speeds faster than one quadrillion calculations per second (petaflop) – remains the world speed champion.

IBM also declared its intent to break the exaflop barrier, and announced that it had created a research 'collaboratory' in Dublin, in partnership with the Industrial Development Agency (IDA) of Ireland, which is focused on both achieving exascale computing and making it useful to business. An exaflop is a million trillion calculations per second, which is 1000 times faster than today's petaflop-class systems.

The latest semi-annual ranking of the World's TOP500 Supercomputer Sites was released today during the International Supercomputing Conference in Hamburg, Germany. Results show the IBM system at Los Alamos National lab, which clocked in at 1.105 petaflops, is nearly three times as energy-efficient as the number 2 computer to maintain similar levels of petascale computing power. IBM's number one system performs 444.9 megaflops per watt of energy compared only 154.2 megaflops per watt for the number 2 system.

Additional highlights from the list include:

Dawn, the initial delivery system for IBM's 20 Petaflop Sequoia system to Lawrence Livermore National Lab, debuts on the List at number 9. Number 3 on the List, an IBM Blue Gene/P system at Forchungzentrum Juelich is the most powerful supercomputer in Europe, with speeds of 825 teraflops. Number 14 on the List, an IBM Blue Gene/P system at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia is the most powerful system in the Middle East, with speeds of 185 teraflops. Number 16 on the List, a System x iDataPlex at SciNet, is the most powerful system in Canada, with speeds of 168 teraflops. IBM led all vendors with 39.38 percent of the total performance on the List with nearly 9 petaflops. IBM led the TOP10 with 5 systems; the TOP50 with 17 systems; and the TOP100 with 35 systems. Nineteen of twenty most energy-efficient systems are from IBM. IBM also provides the most powerful supercomputers in: United Kingdom, Spain, Netherlands, Italy, Taiwan, Israel, Bulgaria, Slovenia and Singapore.

For more read here: <a href='http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/27803.wss''>IBM Korg