1. QPACE -- a QCD parallel computer based on Cell processors
- Author
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Baier, H., Boettiger, H., Drochner, M., Eicker, N., Fischer, U., Fodor, Z., Frommer, A., Gomez, C., Goldrian, G., Heybrock, S., Hierl, D., Hüsken, M., Huth, T., Krill, B., Lauritsen, J., Lippert, T., Maurer, T., Mendl, B., Meyer, N., Nobile, A., Ouda, I., Pivanti, M., Pleiter, D., Ries, M., Schäfer, A., Schick, H., Schifano, F., Simma, H., Solbrig, S., Streuer, T., Sulanke, K. -H., Tripiccione, R., Vogt, J. -S., Wettig, T., and Winter, F.
- Subjects
High Energy Physics - Lattice ,Computer Science - Hardware Architecture - Abstract
QPACE is a novel parallel computer which has been developed to be primarily used for lattice QCD simulations. The compute power is provided by the IBM PowerXCell 8i processor, an enhanced version of the Cell processor that is used in the Playstation 3. The QPACE nodes are interconnected by a custom, application optimized 3-dimensional torus network implemented on an FPGA. To achieve the very high packaging density of 26 TFlops per rack a new water cooling concept has been developed and successfully realized. In this paper we give an overview of the architecture and highlight some important technical details of the system. Furthermore, we provide initial performance results and report on the installation of 8 QPACE racks providing an aggregate peak performance of 200 TFlops., Comment: 21 pages. Poster by T. Maurer and plenary talk by D. Pleiter presented at the "XXVII International Symposium on Lattice Field Theory", July 26-31 2009, Peking University, Beijing, China. Information on recent Green500 ranking added and list of authors extended
- Published
- 2009