High Performance Computing: Microsoft Project and Cray
Microsoft has launched a joint project with Cray to provide Azure customers with access to high-performance computing (HPC) for research in the field of artificial intelligence, modeling and solving demanding analytical tasks.
/ Flickr / Jody McIntyre / CC
According to Barry Bolding, vice president and chief strategic officer of Cray, market analysis has shown that most organizations cannot afford to buy a supercomputer, and the demand for the provision of supercomputer computing in the cloud is growing.
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Increased demand for cloud computing based on HPC is due to the growth of the Big Data market and the need to increase resource productivity when performing heterogeneous workloads. Research and Markets estimates that the cloud HPC market will grow from $ 4.3 billion in 2015 to 10.8 billion by 2020. The annual market growth rate will be 20%.
As they say at Microsoft and Cray, the new service will help biotechnologists to sequence DNA, and engineers in the automotive industry will be able to more effectively simulate emergencies and calculate the aerodynamic characteristics of vehicles.
For example, Formula 1 engineers study the effects on aerodynamics of variables such as surface topography, wheel behavior, and track topography. They also analyze the effect of the curvature of the surface of the car on the downforce and the coefficient of air resistance. The high performance of supercomputers allows you to explore the possibility of setting up race cars between races, which increases the effectiveness of the team.
More HPCaaS will allow you to build highly accurate models of space, climate and financial processes, as well as render video. For example, the computing power of supercomputers was used during the production of the movie "Life Pi". Artists had the opportunity to quickly see how the painted images of the environment would look like in a frame.
Although the service will be released as part of the Azure customer service package, Cray also expects to attract customers from the public sector: universities, weather services and other organizations. Everything will depend on the demand for technology.
Microsoft customers will have access to the Cray XC , Cray CS and Cray ClusterStor repository . All systems will integrate with Azure virtual machines and Azure Data Lake data storage. More cloud service customers will be able to use the system of artificial intelligence and machine learning from Microsoft. According to the IT giant, the solution will be available in 2018.
Cray XC and Cray CS are based on Intel Xeon server chips, Nvidia Tesla P100 graphics accelerators, Xeon Phi co-processors. InfiniBand and Aries networks allow processors to communicate faster than Ethernet.
Cray also offers several ways to connect processors and machines in a cluster with each other. Clients will be able to customize the desired configuration and topology of the system depending on the workload.
Merging with Microsoft is not the first partnership agreement that Cray has entered into. For the first time, the capabilities of a supercomputer in the cloud became available thanks to the collaboration of Cray and Markley companies. The partnership of these companies allowed us to combine the power of Cray supercomputers and high-level hosting of Markley into one HPCaaS solution. The platform was called Urika-GX .
According to scientist Chris Dwan, research and development in the biological sciences and pharmaceuticals require processing a large amount of data. Advances in DNA sequencing mean that the amount of data and the need for analyzing them will soon exceed the capabilities of obsolete infrastructures. The shortest way to a breakthrough in medicine is to make the best technologies available to researchers. Cray's and Markley's HPCaaS solution does just that.
Another alliance, Cray and Deloitte, offers a threat analytics service . Security analysts are faced with a difficult task: the data arrive much faster than they can analyze them, and the missed threat can cause irreparable damage.
The combination of the Cray analytical platform and the risk management service Deloitte Advisory comprehensively analyzes security systems “from the point of view of cybercriminals.” Real-time analysis of big data allows you to detect threats and suspicious activity in real time. The solution effectively allocates computing resources and gives a plausible assessment of the degree of network security.
Other companies besides Cray are also providing high-performance computing services on demand. HPC cloud solution offers Rescale. It gives customers access to high-performance cloud infrastructure and libraries. The platform is presented in three versions:
IBM Spectrum Computing allows users to choose from a variety of public, private, or hybrid cloud infrastructures. IBM offers a range of turnkey solutions for corporate customers: IBM High Performance Services, IBM Spectrum HPC and others.
Cray Inc. - American company engaged in the production of supercomputers. Based in Seattle. The buyers of its technologies are scientific laboratories and security services, meteorological stations, research institutes, IT companies.
PS Three of high performance materials from our corporate blog:
PPS Several materials about the work of the IaaS provider from our blog on Habré:
/ Flickr / Jody McIntyre / CC
According to Barry Bolding, vice president and chief strategic officer of Cray, market analysis has shown that most organizations cannot afford to buy a supercomputer, and the demand for the provision of supercomputer computing in the cloud is growing.
')
Increased demand for cloud computing based on HPC is due to the growth of the Big Data market and the need to increase resource productivity when performing heterogeneous workloads. Research and Markets estimates that the cloud HPC market will grow from $ 4.3 billion in 2015 to 10.8 billion by 2020. The annual market growth rate will be 20%.
As they say at Microsoft and Cray, the new service will help biotechnologists to sequence DNA, and engineers in the automotive industry will be able to more effectively simulate emergencies and calculate the aerodynamic characteristics of vehicles.
For example, Formula 1 engineers study the effects on aerodynamics of variables such as surface topography, wheel behavior, and track topography. They also analyze the effect of the curvature of the surface of the car on the downforce and the coefficient of air resistance. The high performance of supercomputers allows you to explore the possibility of setting up race cars between races, which increases the effectiveness of the team.
More HPCaaS will allow you to build highly accurate models of space, climate and financial processes, as well as render video. For example, the computing power of supercomputers was used during the production of the movie "Life Pi". Artists had the opportunity to quickly see how the painted images of the environment would look like in a frame.
Although the service will be released as part of the Azure customer service package, Cray also expects to attract customers from the public sector: universities, weather services and other organizations. Everything will depend on the demand for technology.
What's inside
Microsoft customers will have access to the Cray XC , Cray CS and Cray ClusterStor repository . All systems will integrate with Azure virtual machines and Azure Data Lake data storage. More cloud service customers will be able to use the system of artificial intelligence and machine learning from Microsoft. According to the IT giant, the solution will be available in 2018.
Cray XC and Cray CS are based on Intel Xeon server chips, Nvidia Tesla P100 graphics accelerators, Xeon Phi co-processors. InfiniBand and Aries networks allow processors to communicate faster than Ethernet.
Cray also offers several ways to connect processors and machines in a cluster with each other. Clients will be able to customize the desired configuration and topology of the system depending on the workload.
Alternatives
Merging with Microsoft is not the first partnership agreement that Cray has entered into. For the first time, the capabilities of a supercomputer in the cloud became available thanks to the collaboration of Cray and Markley companies. The partnership of these companies allowed us to combine the power of Cray supercomputers and high-level hosting of Markley into one HPCaaS solution. The platform was called Urika-GX .
According to scientist Chris Dwan, research and development in the biological sciences and pharmaceuticals require processing a large amount of data. Advances in DNA sequencing mean that the amount of data and the need for analyzing them will soon exceed the capabilities of obsolete infrastructures. The shortest way to a breakthrough in medicine is to make the best technologies available to researchers. Cray's and Markley's HPCaaS solution does just that.
Another alliance, Cray and Deloitte, offers a threat analytics service . Security analysts are faced with a difficult task: the data arrive much faster than they can analyze them, and the missed threat can cause irreparable damage.
The combination of the Cray analytical platform and the risk management service Deloitte Advisory comprehensively analyzes security systems “from the point of view of cybercriminals.” Real-time analysis of big data allows you to detect threats and suspicious activity in real time. The solution effectively allocates computing resources and gives a plausible assessment of the degree of network security.
Other companies besides Cray are also providing high-performance computing services on demand. HPC cloud solution offers Rescale. It gives customers access to high-performance cloud infrastructure and libraries. The platform is presented in three versions:
- ScaleX Pro - for small and medium-sized businesses;
- ScaleX Developer - for application developers and independent software vendors;
- ScaleX Enterprise - for large corporations.
IBM Spectrum Computing allows users to choose from a variety of public, private, or hybrid cloud infrastructures. IBM offers a range of turnkey solutions for corporate customers: IBM High Performance Services, IBM Spectrum HPC and others.
About Cray
Cray Inc. - American company engaged in the production of supercomputers. Based in Seattle. The buyers of its technologies are scientific laboratories and security services, meteorological stations, research institutes, IT companies.
PS Three of high performance materials from our corporate blog:
- How to handle peak loads with IaaS
- vCloud Director 8.10: Storage Policy for Virtual Disks
- IaaS Cloud Troubleshooter: Poor Performance
PPS Several materials about the work of the IaaS provider from our blog on Habré:
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/341746/
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