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In an interesting aproach to distributed computing, some geeks at the University of Antwerp have utilised a dual SLI (four Graphics Cards) rig to crunch numbers for their Image Tomography research. Here is a wrap up from Darkvision Hardware letting us in on the gruesome details:
This new system is used by the ASTRA research group, part of the Vision Lab of the University of Antwerp, to develop new computational methods for tomography. The guys explain the eight NVIDIA GPUs deliver the same performance for their work as more than 300 Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz processors. On a normal desktop PC their tomography tasks would take several weeks but on this NVIDIA-based "supercomputer" it only takes a couple of hours. The NVIDIA graphics cards do the job very efficiently and consume a lot less power than a real supercomputer cluster. The research group ASTRA, part of the Vision Lab of the University of Antwerp, focuses on the development of new computational methods for tomography. Tomography is a technique used in medical scanners to create three-dimensional images of the internal organs of patients, based on a large number of X-ray photos that are acquired over a range of angles. ASTRA develops new reconstruction techniques that lead to better reconstruction quality than classical methods. Here's a look at the specifications of the FASTRA desktop superPC. The main reason why they configured an AMD system is because they couldn't find a motherboard for the Intel platform that could fit four GeForce 9800 GX2 graphics cards. Another interesting note is that this system doesn't need SLI, their application uses the NVIDIA CUDA programming model which makes all eight GPUs work in parallel. The researchers say they don't need SLI during a reconstruction as every graphics card communicates directly with the CPU, no inter-GPU communication is needed. - AMD Phenom 9850 processor + Scythe Infinity CPU cooler
- 4x MSI 9800GX2 graphics card
- 4x 2GB Corsair Twinx DDR2 PC6400 memory
- MSI K9A2 Platinum motherboard
- Samsung Spinpoint F1 750GB HDD
- ThermalTake Toughpower 1500W Modular PSU
- Lian-Li PC-P80 Armorsuit case
- Windows XP 64-bit
A quick note for our American readers, a system with similar specifications would cost you around $3,900 at Newegg. Most computer hardware costs a lot more in Europe than in the U.S. The biggest problem of the system is that these four dual-GPU graphics cards are cramped together and generate quite a lot of heat. The FASTRA uses aircooling and with the sidepanel removed the GPUs run at 55 degrees Celsius in idle, 86 degrees Celsius under full load and 100 degrees Celsius under full load with the shaders 20% overclocked. They have to run the system with the left side panel removed as the graphics cards would otherwise overheat but they're looking for a solution for their heat problem. |
