Graphics developer Nvidia has been talking for years about harnessing the processing power of its GPU designs for purposes other than splattering alien entrails across gamers’ screens, and the company has finally unveiled its plans at the SuperCompute 2008 with the GPU-based Tesla Personal Supercomputer, which claims to deliver 250 times the processing power of a typical PC workstation…yet still maintain the workstation price tag. Although these systems aren’t going to suddenly find their way into gamers’ lairs, anybody who does serious work with massively parallel computing might give the Tesla design serious consideration—and Nvidia has already lined up Dell, Velocity Micro, Colfaz, AMAX, Penguin, Microway, Boxx, Western Scientific, and other partners to produce systems.
