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DAILY NEWS AND INFORMATION
FOR THE GLOBAL GRID COMMUNITY /
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Breaking News -
Platforms:
SGI Returns To LinuxWorld With New
Altix Models
Silicon Graphics (SGI) announced that the worldwide success of its
acclaimed
SGI Altix family of servers and superclusters has proven that the Linux OS is
scalable and robust enough for the most demanding high-performance computing
users. Only a year after its introduction at the 2003 LinuxWorld Conference &
Expo -- where it was named "Best of Show" -- the SGI Altix family returned to
LinuxWorld with new midrange models, a host of 64-bit applications, record
achievements in scalability and performance, and growing worldwide customer
acceptance.
SGI also debuted the new SGI Altix 350 server, which was introduced Jan.
12.
SGI Altix 350 is the only midrange system purpose-built specifically for
scientists, design engineers, researchers and other technical computing
users.
Since its launch a year ago, SGI Altix has defied industry expectations by
becoming the first Linux system to commercially scale to 128 Intel Itanium 2
processors in a single system image -- and thousands more via clustering --
using the powerful SGI NUMAflex global shared-memory architecture. The Altix
architecture handles large data sets with ease, giving software developers an
opportunity to provide 64-bit Linux applications to customers in
manufacturing, oil and gas exploration, homeland security, earth and
environmental sciences research, and life sciences.
"Only a year ago, the common wisdom held that Linux couldn't scale past
eight
processors," said Dave Parry, senior vice president and general manager of the
Server and Platform Group, for SGI. "Working closely with the Linux community,
we have spent the past 12 months repeatedly shattering that misconception with
the Altix family. Without doubt, Linux no longer is relegated to desktop
systems or edge servers. Today it's a robust and field-proven 64-bit
environment capable of tackling the world's toughest computing
challenges."
Production-Quality Linux On Display At LinuxWorld
At LinuxWorld 2004, SGI and its partners spotlighted Linux as a
production-quality platform for high-performance and technical computing and
database applications. A 64-processor SGI Altix 3000 system demonstrated
computational fluid dynamics, computer-aided engineering, data mining
applications, and database software from Sybase and Objectivity. Several Altix
350 servers also were displayed, running leading bioinformatics and chemistry
applications, in addition to a rapid installation demonstration of MySQL
database software. An eight-processor SGI Altix 350 system featured Oracle
Database10g running on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 8.
"Oracle is pleased with SGI's delivery of industry-standard, Linux OS-based
systems that give customers the scalability they need for mission-critical
applications," said Dave Dargo, vice president of the Linux Program Office for
Oracle Corp. "This, combined with Oracle's leading technology and support for
the Linux operating system, offers a compelling solution for enterprise
customers. Oracle customers running on Altix with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
can benefit from Oracle's OS-level, Unbreakable Linux support, the industry's
most comprehensive technical support offering."
SGI also demonstrated the horizontal scalability of its Altix 350 systems.
The
new mid-range SGI Altix 350 can scale to hundreds of nodes over standard
gigabit Ethernet. In addition, via a new agreement announced today, SGI and
Voltaire intend to easily interconnect Altix 350 systems with price-
performance leading InfiniBand, and to enable easy interoperability with
previously installed 32-bit clusters.
The SGI booth also exhibited complete, production-ready storage solutions
for
data-intensive environments. The entire SGI InfiniteStorage product line for
storage consolidation, data lifecycle management, data sharing and protection
is now available for SGI Altix environments. SGI demonstrated instant data
access among heterogeneous platforms, as well as the performance and
scalability features of Open Source XFS and SGI InfiniteStorage Shared
Filesystem CXFS software.
Also, SGI announced an initiative to expand its visualization portfolio
into
the Linux market by leveraging its expertise in Linux scalability. Key to the
initiative is the new SGI Visualization Developer Tool Kit for Linux, designed
to accelerate the pace of innovation for visualization on Linux. At
LinuxWorld, SGI demonstrated the heart of its developer tool kit offering -- a
scalable, multi-CPU, multi-GPU Silicon Graphics visualization system for Linux
built around SGI NUMAflex shared memory architecture.
Silicon Graphics -- The Source of Innovation and Discovery
SGI, also known as Silicon Graphics Inc, is the world's leader in
high-performance computing, visualization and storage. SGI's vision is to
provide technology that enables the most significant scientific and creative
breakthroughs of the 21st century. Whether it's sharing images to aid in brain
surgery, finding oil more efficiently, studying global climate or enabling the
transition from analog to digital broadcasting, SGI is dedicated to addressing
the next class of challenges for scientific, engineering and creative users.
With offices worldwide, the company is headquartered in Mountain View, Calif.,
and can be found on the Web at www.sgi.com.
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