Re: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] VA Tech's "Big Mac", er "X" supercomputer*is* #3

[Mike Miller <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

On Mon, 17 Nov 2003, Jonathan King wrote:

> Oh yeah: obsolescence.  Here's the top-slot computer by year:
>
> 2003 #3  (VaTech, USA)
> 2002 #1  (Earth Simulator, Japan)
>      #2  (ASCI Q, USA)
> 2001 #12 (Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center)
> 2000 #8  (ASCI White, USA)
> 1999 #27 (ASCI Red, USA)             # one of only 12 Top500 boxes
> 1998 #65 (ASCI Blue Mountain, USA)   # one of only 3 Top500 boxes
> 1997 #169 (T3E900 Cray, USA)
>      #294 (T3E900 Cray, UK)   # these are the only 2 Top500 boxes
> 1996 and before: N/A


A thought along similar lines:  I came to Mizzou in 1997 and bought a Sun
computer for about $12,500 (with monitor).  I just got an ad offering
exactly that same model for the price shown below (without monitor, I
assume):

Sun Ultra 2 Workstation w/ CD Rom and Floppy
Dual 200 MHz CPU
256MB Memory
9GB 7200 RPM Hard Drive
Creator Graphics Card
$150.00 Each

Yep, computers are not a good investment!  I was still a little surprised
to see a price that was 1.2% of what I paid.

On the bright side, the machine still works like it used to, still serving
web pages just fine, etc., etc.

Mike
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