Fastest Dutch University Supercomputer Runs Bright Cluster Manager

July 20, 2010 - PRLog -- San Jose, California — Bright Computing, specialist in cluster management software and services for high-performance computing (HPC), is pleased to announce that the University of Groningen has selected Bright Cluster Manager to manage their new 33 TeraFLOPs supercomputer. The supercomputer was delivered by Bright Computing reseller, ClusterVision, and is the fastest computer running in any Dutch university. The supercomputer's 3280 AMD Opteron processor cores and 132 TeraByte of storage will be used by scientists at the university to boost research in various fields of science, including Informatics, Chemistry, Medicine and Genetics.

"Research has a top priority at the University of Groningen. With this new supercomputer from ClusterVision we are able to offer a very powerful service to our user community and support them in achieving their research goals," said Professor Dr. Cees Sterks, General Director of the Donald Smits Center for Information Technology at the University of Groningen.

Hans Gankema, Manager Server Infrastructure, adds "Our new High Performance Compute (HPC) cluster 'Millipede' is a real compute monster and it is the fastest HPC cluster in any Dutch University. ClusterVision did an excellent job in designing, delivering and implementing the cluster. The Bright Cluster Manager software makes the management and monitoring of the cluster very efficient and easy, and it offers a clear insight into the status of the cluster at all times."

The supercomputer runs Bright Cluster Manager — Advanced Edition, which is a Linux-based cluster management software solution that has built-in functionality for large and complex clusters, such as failover head nodes and multiple load-balancing provisioning nodes. Bright Cluster Manager's wide range of monitoring and management functionality, combined with its easy-to-use command line and graphical user interfaces, will save the system administrators at the university substantial time in operating the cluster. The cluster will also run ScaleMP software to serve the needs for applications that require large amounts of memory, as well as the Fraunhofer Global Filesystem (FhGFS).

About the University of Groningen

The University of Groningen has a long academic tradition extending back to 1614, which makes Groningen the oldest university in the Netherlands after Leiden. Many very talented people in a variety of disciplines have studied or worked at the university during the 390 years of its existence, including a Nobel Prize winner, the first female University student in the Netherlands and the first female lecturer, the first Dutch astronaut and the first president of the European Bank. They share their academic roots with more than 200,000 other people who have attended the University of Groningen as students, lecturers or research workers.

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Bright Computing is a specialist in cluster management software and services for high-performance computing (HPC). Its flag-ship product — Bright Cluster Manager — makes clusters of any size easy to install, use and manage.