The
Cray SV1 is a
vector processorA vector processor, or array processor, is a CPU design wherein the instruction set includes operations that can perform mathematical operations on multiple data elements simultaneously. This is in contrast to a scalar processor, which handles one element at a time using multiple instructions. The...
supercomputerA supercomputer is a computer that is at the frontline of current processing capacity, particularly speed of calculation. Supercomputers were introduced in the 1960s and were designed primarily by Seymour Cray at Control Data Corporation , and led the market into the 1970s until Cray left to form...
from the Cray Research division of
Silicon GraphicsSilicon Graphics, Inc. was a manufacturer of high-performance computing solutions, including computer hardware and software, founded in 1981 by Jim Clark and Abbey Silverstone...
introduced in 1998. The SV1 has since been succeeded by the
Cray X1The Cray X1 is a non-uniform memory access, vector processor supercomputer manufactured and sold by Cray Inc. since 2003. The X1 is often described as the unification of the Cray T90, Cray SV1, and Cray T3E architectures into a single machine...
and X1E vector supercomputers. Like its predecessor, the
Cray J90The Cray J90 series was an air-cooled vector processor supercomputer first sold by Cray Research in 1994. The J90 evolved from the Cray Y-MP EL minisupercomputer, and is compatible with Y-MP software, running the same UNICOS operating system. The J90 supported up to 32 CMOS processors with a 10 ns...
, the SV1 used
CMOSComplementary metal–oxide–semiconductor is a technology for making integrated circuits. CMOS technology is used in microprocessors, microcontrollers, static RAM, and other digital logic circuits. CMOS technology is also used for a wide variety of analog circuits such as image sensors, data...
processors, which lowered the cost of the system, and allowed the computer to be air-cooled. The SV1 was backwards compatible with J90 and
Y-MPThe Cray Y-MP was a supercomputer sold by Cray Research from 1988, and the successor to the company's X-MP. The Y-MP retained software compatibility with the X-MP, but extended the address registers from 24 to 32 bits. High-density VLSI ECL technology was used and a new liquid cooling system was...
software, and ran the same UNIX-derived
UNICOSUNICOS is the name of a range of Unix-like operating system variants developed by Cray for its supercomputers. UNICOS is the successor of the Cray Operating System . It provides network clustering and source code compatibility layers for some other Unixes. UNICOS was originally introduced in 1985...
operating systemAn operating system is an interface between hardware and user which is responsible for the management and coordination of activities and the sharing of the resources of the computer that acts as a host for computing applications run on the machine. As a host, one of the purposes of an operating...
.
The
Cray SV1 is a
vector processorA vector processor, or array processor, is a CPU design wherein the instruction set includes operations that can perform mathematical operations on multiple data elements simultaneously. This is in contrast to a scalar processor, which handles one element at a time using multiple instructions. The...
supercomputerA supercomputer is a computer that is at the frontline of current processing capacity, particularly speed of calculation. Supercomputers were introduced in the 1960s and were designed primarily by Seymour Cray at Control Data Corporation , and led the market into the 1970s until Cray left to form...
from the Cray Research division of
Silicon GraphicsSilicon Graphics, Inc. was a manufacturer of high-performance computing solutions, including computer hardware and software, founded in 1981 by Jim Clark and Abbey Silverstone...
introduced in 1998. The SV1 has since been succeeded by the
Cray X1The Cray X1 is a non-uniform memory access, vector processor supercomputer manufactured and sold by Cray Inc. since 2003. The X1 is often described as the unification of the Cray T90, Cray SV1, and Cray T3E architectures into a single machine...
and X1E vector supercomputers. Like its predecessor, the
Cray J90The Cray J90 series was an air-cooled vector processor supercomputer first sold by Cray Research in 1994. The J90 evolved from the Cray Y-MP EL minisupercomputer, and is compatible with Y-MP software, running the same UNICOS operating system. The J90 supported up to 32 CMOS processors with a 10 ns...
, the SV1 used
CMOSComplementary metal–oxide–semiconductor is a technology for making integrated circuits. CMOS technology is used in microprocessors, microcontrollers, static RAM, and other digital logic circuits. CMOS technology is also used for a wide variety of analog circuits such as image sensors, data...
processors, which lowered the cost of the system, and allowed the computer to be air-cooled. The SV1 was backwards compatible with J90 and
Y-MPThe Cray Y-MP was a supercomputer sold by Cray Research from 1988, and the successor to the company's X-MP. The Y-MP retained software compatibility with the X-MP, but extended the address registers from 24 to 32 bits. High-density VLSI ECL technology was used and a new liquid cooling system was...
software, and ran the same UNIX-derived
UNICOSUNICOS is the name of a range of Unix-like operating system variants developed by Cray for its supercomputers. UNICOS is the successor of the Cray Operating System . It provides network clustering and source code compatibility layers for some other Unixes. UNICOS was originally introduced in 1985...
operating systemAn operating system is an interface between hardware and user which is responsible for the management and coordination of activities and the sharing of the resources of the computer that acts as a host for computing applications run on the machine. As a host, one of the purposes of an operating...
. The SV1 used Cray
floating pointIn computing, floating point describes a system for numerical representation in which a string of digits represents a rational number....
representation, not the IEEE 754 floating point format used on the
Cray T3EThe Cray T3E was Cray Research's second-generation massively parallel supercomputer architecture, launched in late November 1995. The first T3E was installed at the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center in 1996. Like the previous Cray T3D, it was a fully distributed memory machine using a 3D torus...
and some
Cray T90The Cray T90 series was the last of a line of vector processing supercomputers manufactured by Cray Research, Inc, superseding the Cray C90 series...
systems.
Unlike earlier Cray designs, the SV1 included a vector cache. It also introduced a feature called multi-streaming, in which one processor from each of four processor boards work together to form a virtual processor with four times the performance. The SV1 processor was clocked at 300 MHz. Later variants of the SV1, the
SV1e and
SV1ex, ran at 500 MHz, the latter also having faster memory and support for the SSD-I Solid-State Storage Device. Systems could include up to 32 processors with up to 512 shared memory buses.
Multiple SV1 cabinets could be clustered together using the GigaRing I/O channel, which also provided connection to
HIPPIHIPPI is a computer bus for the attachment of high speed storage devices to supercomputers. SCSI and Fibre Channel....
, FDDI,
ATMAsynchronous transfer mode is an electronic digital data transmission technology. ATM is implemented as a network protocol and was first developed in the mid 1980s. The goal was to design a single networking strategy that could transport real-time video conference and audio as well as image...
,
EthernetEthernet is a family of frame-based computer networking technologies for local area networks . The name comes from the physical concept of the ether...
and
SCSISmall Computer System Interface, or SCSI , is a set of standards for physically connecting and transferring data between computers and peripheral devices. The SCSI standards define commands, protocols, and electrical and optical interfaces...
devices for network, disk, and tape services. In theory, up to 32 nodes could be clustered together, offering up to one teraflop in theoretical peak performance.
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