When Sony released its PlayStation 2 game console in 2000, little did they know it would end up at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA). NCSA’s researchers now have 70 PlayStation2 consoles running as a cluster using an Ethernet network. The individual machines run on the Sony Linux Kit.
Researchers at NCSA tap the power of PS-2s two powerful vector units designed to manipulate polygons for game displays. A cluster can be used for scientific computation. The Linux kit gives programmers direct access to the processor’s vector units and provides a working and development environment that contains the tools found on more traditional Linux systems. This allows the units to be used for nongraphic, computationally intensive tasks.
Some of the tools commonly found on more traditional high-performance computing clusters have been integrated into the system, including the Message Passing Interface (MPI), which allows the individual consoles to communicate with each other and execute application across all of the machines simultaneously, and the Portable Batch System (PBS) and Maui Scheduler, which manage jobs on cluster systems.
The goal of the PlayStation2 project is to explore the use of inexpensive hardware for high-speed computing. “Many people have talked about the possibilities of the PlayStation’s graphic processors, but to our knowledge, no one else has attempted to make these machines perform as a large, integrated Linux cluster” said Dan Reed, the center’s director. By contrast, it is almost impossible for researchers to install the Linux on Microsoft’s Xbox game console.
Linux is frequently used to assemble high-performance parallel computers built largely out of commodity hardware components. These machines are generally called Beowulf clusters. Here are some other Beowulf Projects.
Sony on Wednesday introduced the PSX, a follow-up to the hugely popular PlayStation 2, and touted it as a device that creates a new entertainment category. In addition to the basic features of a game console, PSX will offer a DVD recorder, a 120GB hard drive, a TV tuner, an Ethernet port, a USB 2.0 port and a Memory Stick slot.
The PSX shares a number of components with PlayStation 2, including the Emotion Engine processor and the operating system. But the company tried to design it as a “digital appliance of the next generation,” and as more than just a game console, by infusing the elements of a PC and an audio-video appliance, said Ken Kutaragi, head of Sony Computer Entertainment.
Although no one from Sony mentioned the much-rumored PlayStation 3, which is expected to debut in 2005, the company hinted at a plan to build a home server that would incorporate the “Cell” chip, a specially designed processor that will be used in the PlayStation 3.
The PSX will be available, first in the Japanese market at the end of the year, and then in the United States and Europe in early 2004.
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