Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Grid Of 100,000 Computers Heralds New Internet Dawn

A network of supercomputers called the Grid will allow information to be downloaded quicker than ever. Tasks that took hours will now take seconds

From The Times Online:

A network of 100,000 computers providing the greatest data processing capacity yet unleashed has been created to cope with information pouring from the world’s largest machine.

The Grid is the latest evolution of the internet and the world wide web and computer scientists will announce on Friday that it is ready to be connected to the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

It is designed for schemes where huge quantities of data need crunching, such as large research and engineering projects. The Grid has the kind of power required to download movies in seconds, and the ability to make high-definition video phone calls for the same price as a local call. More importantly, it should help to narrow the search for cures for diseases. However, it is unlikely to be directly available to most internet users until telecoms providers build the fibre-optic network required to use it.

The Grid allows scientists at CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, to get access to the unemployed processing power of thousands of computers in 33 countries to deal with the data created by the LHC.

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