TOP500

The TOP500 project ranks and details the 500 most powerful known computer systems in the world. The project was started in 1993 and publishes an updated list of the supercomputers twice a year. The project aims to provide a reliable basis for tracking and detecting trends in high-performance computing and bases rankings on [http://www.netlib.org/benchmark/hpl/ HPL] , a portable implementation of the High-Performance LINPACK benchmark for distributed-memory computers.

The TOP500 list is compiled by Hans Meuer of the University of Mannheim, Germany, Jack Dongarra of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Erich Strohmaier and Horst Simon of NERSC/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

The list is updated twice a year. The first of these updates always coincides with the [http://www.supercomp.de/ International Supercomputer Conference] in June, the second one is presented in November at the IEEE Super Computer Conference in the USA.

Project history

In the early nineties, a new definition of supercomputer was needed to produce meaningful statistics. After experimenting with metrics based on processor count in 1992, the idea was born at the University of Mannheim to use a detailed listing of installed systems as the basis. Early 1993 Jack Dongarra was convinced to join the project with his Linpack benchmark. A first test version was produced in May 1993, partially based on data available on the Internet, including the following sources: [ [http://www.hpcwire.com/archives/10219.html AN INTERVIEW WITH JACK DONGARRA by Alan Beck, editor in chief HPCwire ] ] [ [http://www.netlib.org/benchmark/top500/reports/report93/section2_16_4.html Statistics on Manufacturers and Continents ] ]
* [http://www.top500.org/reports/1993/chapter2_4.html Mannheim Supercomputer Statistics] 1986-1992
*one was " [http://www.hoise.com/primeur/PL/96/pl-top500/ES-PL-11-96-4.html List of the World's Most Powerful Computing Sites] " maintained by Gunter Ahrendt
*another was through David Kahaner, who had an immense amount of data.

The information from those sources was used for the first two lists. Since June 1993 the TOP500 is produced bi-annually based on site and vendor submissions only.

The systems ranked #1 since 1993

*IBM Roadrunner (since 2008.06)
*IBM Blue Gene/L (2004.11 - 2008.06)
*NEC Earth Simulator (2002.06 - 2004.11)
*IBM ASCI White (2000.11 - 2002.06)
*Intel ASCI Red (1997.06 - 2000.11)
*Hitachi CP-PACS (1996.11 - 1997.06)
*Hitachi SR2201 (1996.06 - 1996.11)
*Fujitsu Numerical Wind Tunnel (1994.11 - 1996.06)
*Intel Paragon XP/S140 (1994.06 - 1994.11)
*Fujitsu Numerical Wind Tunnel (1993.11 - 1994.06)
*TMC CM-5 (1993.06 - 1993.11)

List as of June 2008

The following table gives the Top 10 positions of the 31st TOP500 List released during the ISC08 conference, June 18, 2008 in Dresden, Germany. [ [http://www.supercomp.de/isc08/ ISC08 ] ]

Legend

* Rank – Self explanatory, fastest computer on top.
* Rmax – The highest score measured using the LINPACK benchmark suite. This is the number which is used to rank the computers. Measured in trillions of floating point operations per second, i.e. Teraflops.
* Rpeak – This is the theoretical peak performance of the system. Measured in Tflops.
* Name – Some supercomputers are unique, at least on its location, and are therefore christened by its owner.
* Computer – The computing platform as it is marketed.
* Processor cores – The number of active processor cores actively used running Linpack. After this figure is the processor architecture of the cores named. If the interconnect between computing nodes is of interest, it's also included here.
* Maker – The manufacturer of the platform and hardware.
* Site – The name of the facility operating the supercomputer.
* Country – The country in which the computer is situated.
* Year – The year the supercomputer went online. Since then the computer might have been upgraded.

References

External links

* [http://www.top500.org/ Top500.org]
* [http://www.netlib.org/benchmark/hpl/ Netlib]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTIKUxO9kf4 An Overview of High Performance Computing and Challenges for the Future] - Jack Dongarra disusses the TOP500 benchmark, its history and its trends.
* [http://www.green500.org/ Green500] - Top500 supercomputers ranked by energy efficiency.