History Of The Super Computer

Just like our home computers, super Computers have come a long way in a fairly short time. They follow the history of computers themselves. We use supercomputers today to model things that are simply too complex to design in the real world. Such otherwise impossible tasks such as finding out the load tolerances of parts and structures before the building or parts are even constructed. Other great feats such as planning the course for the moon landing could not have been done without the help of the best computers of the day. We are even able to map our own genetic sequences thanks to the help of super computers. But how did they get their start?

Early Supercomputers

Most attribute the first supercomputer to be the Zuse Z3. While not technically a supercomputer by today’s standards, it was the first programmable computing device, which certainly made it the super computer of its day. The first real supercomputer came about in the 1960’s from what would come to be the market leader in super computing, Cray Research. While the earliest Super Computers where used for Code Breaking in WWII, the 60’s found that accounting and payroll were the areas that required the most computing power. To take en entire accounting department and reduce it to a room sized machine was a huge coup in its day. By the 70’s these monster computers were starting to be used to calculate things that aerodynamics and fluid dynamics, making planes and ships that were much more efficient and faster than any before them. Weather forecasting also began to find popularity with super computers, as there was finally enough processing power to take into account the many factors that make up the weather and how they interact with each other.

Modern Supercomputers

Super computers were doing great, with Cray still making them for many companies and institutions as well other high end companies making super powerful one off models. By the 90’s they were even being used to simulate nuclear bomb testing, rather than have to detonate a real device in the atmosphere. More information can be found at http://ei.cs.vt.edu/~history/SUPERCOM.Calle.HTML

Death Of The Super Computer

An unfortunate thing happened to supercomputers in the late 1990s however. PC’s began catching up. Supercomputers had been using completely one off parts right down to their CPU’s. But commercially available CPU’s began to have equivalent if not greater processing power. As the parallelism trend of multiple CPU’s continued, this caused a crash in the proprietary super computer market. Today the greatest super computers are using off the shelf parts in large numbers. In fact, a current state of the art PC is much faster than the fastest Cray Super computer in the 90s. The super computer cluster has taken over, with the IBM Mira which will be in production soon as the world’s fastest Supercomputer, and will keep the race running. More information about Mira can be found at http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/33586.wss.