When I read this I thought it was a joke. I know for a fact this is actually real. The US Air Force Research Labs has been using PS3's in a cluster as a Super Computer.
I guess they saw the hype on the XBox 360's "Ring of Death" and skipped that console entirely - LMFAO!
Talk about a Gamers Paradise - they hooked up 336 PS's to create a 53 Teraflop Cluster in 2009 - THEN added another 1,700 PS3s in early 2010 because the tests were so positive.
The reason for this was the fact it was cheaper to use the PS3 game systems with the 160GB drives than to use actual servers. In actuality these are not hooked up to the Sony environment, so there is no issues with them running these as they are. But if one dies, where are they getting a replacement? Even if you send them in under warranty to be fixed, you will get back a unit with the GameOS and it will not allow you to add any other OS to it - ARGH!
Sources: Sankaku Complex | ARS Technica
Someone will come up with some way to add an OS, a lot of the reason I bought PS3 when I did was so that I could have one with another OS on it. Otherwise I would have bought the cheaper version.
ReplyDeleteNow that's exploitation. Who would've thought? The Air Force henceforth gets brownie points from me.
ReplyDeleteWell, it's less amusing once you remember the USA disallowed exporting X-Boxes in the beginning in fear their chips will be used in missiles!
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