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Subject: Re: Multi-Hydra Computer Feasible in Future?

Author: Slater Wold

Date: 12:29:55 02/15/04

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On February 15, 2004 at 15:22:10, Bob Durrett wrote:

>On February 15, 2004 at 15:20:01, Slater Wold wrote:
>
>>On February 15, 2004 at 15:17:28, Bob Durrett wrote:
>>
>>>On February 15, 2004 at 15:14:16, Slater Wold wrote:
>>>
>>>>On February 15, 2004 at 15:09:57, Bob Durrett wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>On February 15, 2004 at 15:06:26, Slater Wold wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>On February 15, 2004 at 14:34:08, Bob Durrett wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>I envision a standard equipment rack with 32 or 64 Hydra cards, a power supply,
>>>>>>>possibly a conventional computer for orchestration, and fans.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Do you think Hydra was running on a single computer, with a single card?
>>>>>
>>>>>Actually, that is what I thought.  What was actually done?
>>>>
>>>>4 Dual Xeon 2.4Ghz PCs & 8 FPGA cards (2 per PC)
>>>>
>>>>The PCs are probably $5k a piece.  The cards, about $500 a piece.
>>>>
>>>>$25k worth of hardware, just to draw Shredder 8 ($50 program) on a PC.
>>>
>>>You forgot to add in the cost of the computer Shredder was running on.
>>
>>I said 'on a PC'!!
>>
>>>>Still think Hydra is the 'engine of the future'?  :)
>>>
>>>Well, the idea that four Hydra cards were used is encouraging because that
>>>suggests that using multiple Hydra cards is a workable idea.  I do not
>>>understand, however, why two separate PCs were required.  Any ideas about that?
>>
>>They used 4 seperate PCs.  2 cards, per PC.
>>
>>I am sure it has something to do with PCI bus saturation.
>
>Now you're "going technical" on me!  : )

Surely you know what a PCI slot is.

Now imagine you put a card into a PCI slot.

Imagine that card sends back sooo much chess data, PVs, depths, etc., etc. that
eventually, it overwhelms the computer.

That's PCI bus staturation, in a very tiny nutshell.



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