Encanto supercomputer goes online in New Mexico
No, this ain’t the newest, fastest supercomputer in the world, although – come to think of it – it is the fastest supercomputer owned by a state government.
Gov. Bill Richardson spearheaded the launch on Monday of eight “gateway” sites to connect communities across New Mexico with the state’s supercomputer in Rio Rancho.
The sites will be used by universities and local businesses that need high-performance computing for design and modeling purposes. Users can access the supercomputer, dubbed “Encanto,” for research, educational activities, training and business modeling in the areas of energy, environment, digital film and biotechnology, said Richardson.
“The opening of these supercomputer gateways is significant to New Mexico’s economic and high-tech future,” Richardson said. “We’re bringing the highest level of supercomputing to every corner of the state, giving New Mexicans the opportunity to tap in to its remarkable educational and economic possibilities…”
At today’s launch event, Richardson met “virtually” with university and college heads from the gateway sites, using the supercomputer’s teleconferencing capabilities…
Encanto is housed at the Intel facility in Rio Rancho. It can perform 172 trillion calculations per second.
Rock on, Governor Bill.
Good job Bill and New Mexico.
I’m just wondering how long ago my lowly desktop would have been considered in the supercomputer class?
Mr. Fusion
January 26, 2010 at 9:24 am
My first desktop PC (my 2nd computer) ran at 7.5mhz in Turbo mode. Now, I’m using an iMac that cost a third of what that PC ran me – pretty average cpu trucking along at 2.8Ghz on a dual core processor.
That’s more horsepower than we were putting into space not too long ago.
moss
January 26, 2010 at 9:33 am