A number of companies, including IBM, have been working together on a new supercomputer that was rolled out by BristolUniversity in England. Capable of 37 trillion calculations each second, Blue Crystal – as it’s known – will be used to help with research on aerospace engineering, climatechange and drug design. With a $14 million price tag it’s unlikely to be affordable to run those games really fast in your living room, however. "Serious research in manydisciplines can no longer be undertaken without high performance computing, and the University has recognized this through its investment in BlueCrystal," according to the director of Bristol’sadvanced computing research centre, Dr. Ian Stewart. "HPC-based research contributes significantly to University research income and will play an increasingly important role in teaching."
Tag Archive: Bristol
University Displays New Supercomputer
HP Narrows R&D Focus
Technology giant Hewlett-Packard has announced it will focus its research and development efforts on a handful of “big bets” rather than funding development of hundreds of smaller projects. The new approach for HP Labs has HP consolidating its efforts into 23 distinct labs in seven locations around the world (Palo Alta, Beijing, Bangalore, Bristol, Haifa, St. Petersburg, and Tokyo) under the supervision of Prith Banerjee; the labs will work on 20 to 30 large research projects, rathern than the 150 or so projects the labs attempted to manage in the past.
Mr. Modchips Looks At Jail
He called himself Mr. Modchips, but the only thing he might be modifying in the near future is a jail cell. The man, whose real name is Neil Higgs, from Bristol, UK, was found guilty last week of 26 offenses under a 2003 amendment to the 1988 Copyright Act. He’s the second person in the UK to be found guilty under the amendment, which was introduced to stop these kinds of chip offenses. A Mr Modchips site appears to still be operating, but it’s unclear whether this is linked to Higgs. Higgs had been in business for five years and had made over $2 million from his business, selling chips that modify games consoles and allow them to play pirated games. He first came to the notice of authorities last year, and a raid on his parents’ home netted a number of computers containing over 200,000 e-mails, along with 3,700 chips imported from Hong Kong. Michael Rawlinson, of the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers’ Association, which, along with Trading Standards, had conducted the raid, said, “It marks a milestone in the fight against piracy.” Pirate chips cost the gaming industry over $10 billion a year. Higgs was given leave to appeal, and his sentencing will take place at a later date.
