News US Air Force buys 2200 PlayStation 3s

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2009/11/24/us-air-force-buys-2200-playstation-3s/1

The US Air Force has revealed that it's bought more than 2000 PlayStation 3s. For research.

 

How come they use PS3's for computing arrays? Hope somebody can explain in which aspect a PS3 is better than the latest and fastest GPU's with CUDA and Physix?
Thaks

 

Warhawk counts as research, right?

 

Imagine all the good that they could (but will not) be doing if they used all that power for Folding and not war mongering.

 

I'm actually all for this - firstly, it's got to be cheaper than proper supercomputer arrays, secondly, maybe the US will stick to Modern Warfare 2 rather than Gulf Warfare 2 next time and thirdly, it helps very slightly with the PS3's disappointing sales. Plus if they'd bought Wiis they'd be laughed at.

I know it's not a PS3 game, but imagine how tense a good game of DEFCON would be in the War Room!

 

Classic decision by committee. IBM have announced that the cell processor tech is an 'evolutionary dead end'. Maybe in 5 years or so they will decide GPU processors are the way to go...

 

"2200 new PlayStation 3s"

Thats going to be a waste of money then seen as the new slim ps3's don't support 3rd party OS'es

 

Their probably learning new things or using examples from Modern Warfare 2

 

I believe a PS3 gives more flops per watt than a video card, also, I'm thinking if they're not for gaming, they'd have to be the old fat ones to support Linux. Kind of strange

 

PS3s are better in some areas, and does draw lesser power.

And they take up lesser space.

 

......and cost less than Nvidia Tesla / Cuda / Whatevertheycall it setups.

 

But cost are not an issue to defence and governemt projects. They use SSD on their systems.....
I'm still not convinced... either I'm wrong or times have changed and governments ARE actually capped by a budget

 

cost would be one

yes, I know..... to me this seems silly, but the US is never known for intelligent ideas

if the US Air Force is going all eco on us, does that mean missiles and nukes are going to be filled with pot pourri now

 

When will Sony and IBM team up and release a dedicated system that is simply designed for crunching numbers? I guess you could fit two motherboards and psus into a 1u chassis with a bit of squeezing.

 

Probably not doing Sony any favours really, how much money does Sony make/loose on each console? Its not like the Air Force are going to be buying any games for these consoles we all know they are being used to run a second Star Gate.

 

You mean, like this?

(It is now discontinued, btw)

 

Very modular, easy to swap out nodes as and when. No need to keep a massive stock of spare boards, dimms etc.

If you want to build a supercomputer you want each node to be as fast as possible while being as architectually simple as possible. An i7 + SLI + CUDA solution (for example) will no doubt be great but is based on tech designed to be compatible and expandible. A console is just plug and play

 

They've had an existing array, they also didn't mention if they had bought the Slim PS3s or the regular PS3s. Being a government agency and buying so many, they had a say in which version of the PS3 they bought.

 

Well does anyone really expect the gov to spend money in efficient ways.

What is funny is that they actually cost Sony a bunch of money because they are not going to buy any games rofl