Windows HPC Server 2008 goes RTM

Stephen Withers
Tuesday, 23 September 2008 12:40

Business IT - Technology

Windows HPC Server 2008 is the latest member of Microsoft's operating systems family to go into production. HPC - high performance computing - is aimed at customers with major number-crunching tasks.

Clustered computers are suitable for a wide variety of applications that can be broken down into tasks that can be carried out in parallel. Examples can be found in science, engineering and finance.

According to the Top500 list, most (over 85 percent) of the world's fastest supercomputers run Linux.

Earlier in the year, Microsoft made it into the upper reaches of the Top500, with a prerelease version of HPC Server 2008 running on Dell PowerEdge hardware at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications coming in at number 23.

Other systems running HPC Server 2008 that made the Top100 were an IBM BladeCenter installation at Sweden's Umea University (39) and  Fujitsu-Siemens Primergy servers at the Universitaet Aachen/RWTH, Germany (100).

HPC Server 2008 is being especially marketed to the finance industry, and was launched at an event aimed at Wall Street firms.

Financial services firms that have been working with prerelease versions include Lloyds TSB Bank and Morgan Stanley.

What's the attraction for the finance industry? Please read on.