How to build supercomputer from PS3 consols?

Once you get bored playing games on Playstation 3 you can get few more and build yourself a supercomputer cluster. If you don't know how to do this don't despair. Advanced Technology & Manufacturing Center from University of Massachusetts Dartmouth has just the thing you need - detailed instructions how to set up your cluster.

The process is relatively simple:

1. Install Linux (in this case Fedora 8)
2. Set up Message Passing Interface and Cell SDK
3. Start number crunching

Of course I have left out all details from steps 1 and 2 but this should not be very difficult.
The resources page may be visited quite often especially if you are not familiar with Cell chip and graphics side of PS3.

Comment from a Professor Gaurav Khanna from UMASS about PS3:

For the same cost, you can build your own supercomputer and it works just as well if not better. Plus, you can use it over and over again, indefinitely.

So, don't turn off your PS3 yet!

GPU or not to GPU, that is the question

Not too long ago nVidia purchased Ageia and their PhysX technology (I wrote about this before). The whole physics will be (already is?) implemented as software solution in CUDA technology. Now GPU is working faster and doing more work than CPU! But wait! There's more! We can have not 2, not 3 but 4 graphics card in SLI mode!! Of course it will cost you dearly but you will get quite a significant performance boost.

On the other hand, Intel is saying who need's graphic card when you have 8 cores. To back up their statement they have demonstrated fire spreading generated on the Nahalem processors. Check out the video and article here. So, all you need is 8 or more cores and you're all set.

So, what it is going to be? I think it will be a status quo for a while. Graphics card manufactures will keep pumping out newer and better cards, CPUs will be multicore with 16 or 32 cores. The bottleneck is most likely to be the software - namely operating system and the applications. It is not easy to write software that does decent multi threading support for 4 cores not to mention 16 or more cores.

Anyway end users (and gamers) can expect better and more realistic games and even more eye candy.

Intel cut prices for Quad Core CPUs

A few days ago Intel decided it is time to play hard against AMD. So, Intel has dropped prices for a whole range of the CPUs. Most significant change is for Core 2 Quad Q6700. Price is now 50% cheaper - US$266. Another CPU with 50% price cut is Quad Core Xeon X3230 - US$255.

Core 2 Quad Q6700

This is not the only CPU that has price slashed. Other CPUs with notable price drops are Core 2 Duo E6850 (31% price drop), Dual Core Xeon 3085 - 29%.

Xeon 3085

If you are interested in official list have a look on Intel's corporate media list. I would find it more interesting if they list only CPU that have price changed.

Now it should be just a matter of time to see these in cheap(er) PC near you.