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Cheyenne Super Computer Auction

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Re: Cheyenne Super Computer Auction

#151

Post by dunham »

emchammer wrote: post #144
dataflow360 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The company with the original tech was called Princeton Video Imaging, in NJ. I interned for them one summer in... 1996? They had sold their tech to Padres and Giants broadcasts initially to put ads on the outfield. The first down line came a bit later and was a much better use of their tech. Princeton Video Imaging even got a shout out (1-line) at the end of every NFL game for a while.

This sounds a lot like the system which drew the halo and trails on the hockey puck for NHL games, FoxTrax.

Yeah, it's been a while, but I recall hockey getting it first, people not liking it, and then it working out for the football version.

Re: Cheyenne Super Computer Auction

#152

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

dekhn wrote: post #127
jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So he would build parts by first making an oversize rough blank of bonded layers of marine grade plywood in a big press. Then he'd rough cut it various ways on a big band saw. Then he'd work his way through using all the sanders to slowly approach the net shape. He used precision squares to measure bigger stuff and calipers for smaller stuff. I can't tell you the exact stability of marine grade plywood, but I know it…

Plywood is good for dimensional stability, but I'm pretty sure all this work must have been done in and around a toolroom with stable moisture content or the part was used immediately and then consumed/destroyed before it "moves" too much. However, he sounds like he's pretty knowledgeable so I'm going to guess this isn't just garage woodworking where 1/32" doesn't really matter when the wood is going to shrink/expand…

So the patterns once done would be taken to a foundry where they'd be used to make molds. I'm not totally up to speed on that process but I know it involves surrounding the pattern with a combination of refractory sand and binder. Where it gets tricky is complex parts that have multiple cores and so on.

And yeah, this guy was retired at the time but he'd been doing it for like 50 years. I'm very sure he knew what did and did not matter.

Re: Cheyenne Super Computer Auction

#153

Post by bufferoverflow »

ceinewydd wrote: post #139
bufferoverflow wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some crypto is ASIC- and GPU-resistant. Monero is one of them.

Sure, but you can get (much) better price-performance-power out of a CPU which isn't approaching a decade old, when mining ASIC and GPU-resistant cryptocurrencies like Manero. I don't know it'd be worth the effort to buy E5-2697-v4 CPUs which are running in such a specialized configuration over and above AMD Ryzen or EPYC CPUs in commodity, inexpensive mainboards.

Depends on the price this supercomputer sells at.

Re: Cheyenne Super Computer Auction

#154

Post by guenthert »

Animats wrote: post #90

It's really hard to find a home for large, old, high-maintenance technology. What do you do with a locomotive, or a Linotype? They need a support facility and staff to be more than scrap. So they're really cheap when available. The Pacific Locomotive Association is an organization with that problem. About 20 locomotives, stored at Brightside near Sunol. They've been able to get about half of them working. It's all vo…

Funny, just yesterday I saw here in Germany a train where the locomotive was labeled 'rent me'. Apparently there's an organization which bought old locomotives (this particular one looked like 60s, maybe early 70s vintage) from the state-run former monopoly to rent them out (large industrial customers I'd think).

I was surprised to see such an old locomotive in operation, but apparently it's still good (i.e. economic) enough to shuttle cars from factory to port. Guess the air pollution restrictions aren't all that tough for diesel trains.

EDIT: didn't realize this is big business in Germany: https://railmarket.com/eu/germany/locomotive-rental-leasing

Re: Cheyenne Super Computer Auction

#156

Post by dekhn »

latchkey wrote: post #126
dekhn wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But who did the wiring? Even with blades which consolidate much of the cabling, there's still a tremendous amount of work to build the interconnect. On typical large systems I've seen a small team 3-5 guys working weeks+ to wire a modest DC.

We'd hire the initial deployment out to temporary contractors. It just took a few weeks to get a large deployment out. The hard part was the 12 GPUs needed to be inserted at the DC, which took a bunch of effort. Once it was done we generally had 1-2 people on the ground in the data centers to deal with breakfixes. Either contractors or supplied by the DC. For this venture, again, we are starting small, so we are just…

I just realized we had this same conversation on HN before. IIRC I said last time and I'll repeat: if you say that you set up 15K GPUs with 2 people, and I ask who did the wiring, and you say an external company came in and spent a few weeks wiring the network for you, then you can't say that 2 people set up 15K GPUs. You're trying to externalize real costs (both time and money).

I understand your dream (having pursued similar ideas) but I think you have ot be realistic about the effort required, especially when you add picky customers to the mix.

Re: Cheyenne Super Computer Auction

#157

Post by latchkey »

dekhn wrote: post #156
latchkey wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We'd hire the initial deployment out to temporary contractors. It just took a few weeks to get a large deployment out. The hard part was the 12 GPUs needed to be inserted at the DC, which took a bunch of effort. Once it was done we generally had 1-2 people on the ground in the data centers to deal with breakfixes. Either contractors or supplied by the DC. For this venture, again, we are starting small, so we are just…

I just realized we had this same conversation on HN before. IIRC I said last time and I'll repeat: if you say that you set up 15K GPUs with 2 people, and I ask who did the wiring, and you say an external company came in and spent a few weeks wiring the network for you, then you can't say that 2 people set up 15K GPUs. You're trying to externalize real costs (both time and money). I understand your dream (having pursu…

Now you're nit picking two days later, which is fine. Sure, you got me there!

Two people hired some temporary workers and asked them to perform a task to get us up and running, which lasted a few days, out of years of operation.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Re: Cheyenne Super Computer Auction

#159

Post by araes »

araes wrote: post #150
Isamu wrote: post #4

>Components of the Cheyenne Supercomputer Installed Configuration: SGI ICE™ XA. E-Cells: 14 units weighing 1500 lbs. each. E-Racks: 28 units, all water-cooled Nodes: 4,032 dual socket units configured as quad-node blades Processors: 8,064 units of E5-2697v4 (18-core, 2.3 GHz base frequency, Turbo up to 3.6GHz, 145W TDP) Total Cores: 145,152 Memory: DDR4-2400 ECC single-rank, 64 GB per node, with 3 High Memory E-Cells…

If somebody has the money, and the resources required to house the system, seems like decent value for the money at the reserve (apparently $100k) The range of, I'd buy if I had the money and a valid use case. Even partial resale like suggested. There's an argument about being behind the "most" advanced. Yet, its a petascale server from 2016 that was good enough for the NSF. It's not exactly an old dog. The stuff I c…

Apparently it ended up selling for the cost of the CPUs at $480,000. Also, guess my math was low, and it was a 47 ton computer.

https://cowboystatedaily.com/2024/05/07/cheyenne-supercomput...

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