HPCwire: The Week in Review

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April 09, 2009

The Week in Review

by John E. West, for HPCwire

Here is a collection of highlights, selected totally subjectively, from this week's HPC news stream as reported at insideHPC.com and HPCwire.

10 words and a link

DARPA awards Rice for ubiquitous application performance improvement tools

Arkansas creates cyberinfrastructure task force

NVIDIA introduces CUDA 2.2 Beta

Google unveils secret server design, DC and batteries built in

New version of Berkeley Lab Checkpoint Restart announced

Terabit Ethernet moves closer to reality

Harvard becomes next CUDA center of excellence

If you're going green, tape is the way to go

Cilk Arts intros new performance analysis tool

TACC deploys data intensive computing system

House testimony on NITRD Act of 2009

Finding cultural patterns in visual electronic media with HPC

Intel Ct slated to appear in beta programmer tools

SiCortex Announces Record Growth

The folks over at SiCortex today announced record growth in Q1 of 2009, to the tune of 100 percent. The company's bookings grew by 122 percent from Q4 of 2008 to Q1 2009, with average system values rising by more than 50 percent. According to the release, they added ten new customers this quarter across US and Canada. These included government entities, universities and commercial organizations.

New customer Catherine Cooper, associate professor in the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Washington State University, commented, "I'm incredibly excited to have the machine installed here. It will perform the calculations that make my research on Earth processes possible. One of the main reasons I chose to purchase this [SiCortex] machine is that it's engineered to work on much less electricity...the bottom line is that we need to be as efficient as we can, and this machine fits with that goal."

Good news from the SiCortex camp. Outside of the pure numbers, one should especially pay attention to its commercial sales. In an economy such as this, the "new kid on the street" continues to grow and impress. For more info, read the full release.

Sun board rejects IBM bid, is the whole thing off?

This is being reported in several places, but I like the Wired version:

The merger of IBM and Sun Microsystems appears to be coming apart, according to several reports, after a chain of events over the weekend which saw Big Blue reduce its $7 billion offer, the Sun board reject IBM's formal takeover proposal and IBM then withdraw the bid completely.

Evidently Scott McNealy jumped in and voiced his opposition, despite the current CEO's support of the deal. But it might not really be over:

The New York Times also reports that this deal is toast -- but that another deal may rise from the ashes: "Whether the IBM decision amounts to a negotiating tactic to get agreement on the final sticking points is unclear. Though the offer is off the table for now, the two sides could resume bargaining if Sun's share price drops from its $8.49 close on Friday [April 3] and major investors pressure the company to come to an agreement."

The article also posits that Sun may not have many other options:

It isn't clear what Sun's options absent IBM interest would be; Sun shares rallied last month to match the 100% premium Big Blue's offer implied -- and dropped about 24% on the open Monday. No other suitor is knows [sic] to exist for the once-iconic Silicon Valley company. And, having put itself in play, customers may be skittish about its prospects and commitment if the merger doesn't go through.

I heard early in the week that Google might be in the hunt. Unlike IBM, Google might actually like Sun's software position, though it probably won't have much use for the hardware. Things have been quiet with respect to Google rumors for the rest of the week, though, so this one might have been just wishful thinking.

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John West is part of the team that summarizes the headlines in HPC news every day at insideHPC.com. You can contact him at john@insidehpc.com.