supercomputer
Extreme calculation machine
A supercomputer is an extremely powerful computer designed for intensive computational tasks—weather modeling, nuclear simulations, cryptography, scientific research.
The term is relative to its era; today's laptops exceed yesterday's supercomputers.
The climate model runs on a supercomputer at the national lab.
Computational speed unit
- petaflopsQuadrillion floating-point operations per second
- gigahertzFrequency unit, billions
- throughputProcessing rate over time
- bandwidthData transmission capacity
latency · benchmarking · parallelism · pipelining · cores · processors · cache · overclocking
Budget American airline
- SierraSaw-toothed mountain range
- ENIACFirst general-purpose electronic computer
- UNIVACEarly electronic mainframe
- TitanMythic giant or moon
Aurora · Leonardo · IBM · Hewlett-Packard · Argonne
Imitation of real processes
- modelingSimulating or demonstrating form
- climatePrevailing atmospheric conditions
- astrophysicsPhysics of celestial bodies
- genomicsStudy of entire genetic sequences
bioinformatics · cryptography · cosmology · seismology · fusion · nuclear · aerospace · epidemiology
Finite problem-solving procedure
- optimizationMaximizing efficiency or performance
- matrixOrdered numerical arrangement
- analyticsSystematic examination of datasets
- renderingInterpretive depiction or performance
Points of connection
- clustersGrouped collections
- interconnectsJoins separate things together
- processorsData-handling circuits
- GPUsParallel processing chips
CPUs · memory · storage · cooling · racks · blades · parallel · distributed
Quantum information unit
- entanglementState of being intertwined
- superpositionCoexisting in multiple states
- cryogenicExtremely low temperature
- coherenceLogical internal consistency
teraflops
Computational speed unit
- petaflopsQuadrillion floating-point operations per second
- gigahertzFrequency unit, billions
- throughputProcessing rate over time
bandwidth · latency · benchmarking · parallelism · pipelining · cores · processors · cache · overclocking · real-time
Frontier
Budget American airline
simulation
Imitation of real processes
- modelingSimulating or demonstrating form
- climatePrevailing atmospheric conditions
- astrophysicsPhysics of celestial bodies
genomics · bioinformatics · cryptography · cosmology · seismology · fusion · nuclear · aerospace · epidemiology
algorithm
Finite problem-solving procedure
- optimizationMaximizing efficiency or performance
- matrixOrdered numerical arrangement
- analyticsSystematic examination of datasets
nodes
Points of connection
- clustersGrouped collections
- interconnectsJoins separate things together
- processorsData-handling circuits
GPUs · CPUs · memory · storage · cooling · racks · blades · parallel · distributed · hybrid
qubit
Quantum information unit
- entanglementState of being intertwined
- superpositionCoexisting in multiple states
- cryogenicExtremely low temperature
- "super" wordssuperstar, superman, superwoman, superpower, supermarket
- Big ScienceCERN, Large Hadron Collider, LHC, particle accelerator, synchrotron
- computerscomputers, desktop, desktops, laptop, laptops
- campus techstudent portal, LMS, IT support, help desk, library systems
- Supercomputingparallel processing, petaflops, teraflop, cluster, number crunching
- Linux devicesRaspberry Pi, server, web server, embedded system, NAS
supercomputerpocket calculator
Portable electronic math tool
calculator · basic calculator · laptop · desktop computer · personal computer
supercomputerabacus
Bead-and-wire arithmetic tool
slide rule · adding machine · tally sticks · analog computer · fingers
supercomputerlaptop
Portable hinged computer
microcomputer · home computer · handheld device · minicomputer · personal computer