Tue, Mar 04, 2008 | 21:29 GMT
PS3 tower used to calculate black hole disaster
Check this out. Astrophysicist Gaurav Khanna has stacked together 16 PS3s to make a super-computer, as you do, for the purpose of simulating black hole collisions. Apparently the Cell processor makes PS3 a better choice for this sort of stuff than your average desktop.
“Overall, a single PS3 performs better than the highest-end desktops available and compares to as many as 25 nodes of an IBM Blue Gene supercomputer,” Khanna said.
Here’s his site, which describes what he’s doing with his 16 Linux-powered PS3s. This guy’s got a fucking “PlayStation 3 Gravity Grid“. He has our respect.
6 
Posted in: PS3, Stuff
Tags: black hole, mentalism
6 comments
#1
Blerk
05/03/08, 10:49 am
Wouldn’t putting 16 PS3s in a single room actually create a black hole anyway?
#2
patlike
05/03/08, 10:51 am
Not far off. I so want 16 PS3s in a single room, and I have no idea why.
#3
Rhythm
05/03/08, 11:20 am
You can buy PS3 clusters directly from Terrasoft, the peeps behind Yellow Dog Linux. Apparently they are actually pretty decent at certain types of supercomputer tasks :-/
#4
patlike
05/03/08, 11:22 am
Sounds like it. I know when PS2 came out it was far ahead of its time in terms of power. It was actually blocked from certain countries because it had potential as a missile guidance system.
#5
Syrok
05/03/08, 11:53 am
Really? I tought that was just a myth.
#6
patlike
05/03/08, 11:54 am
Nah, it was true. I appeared in a Channel 4 report about it at the time. They showed video of rockets being launched, and everything