El Capitan supercomputer has recently claimed the title of the most powerful in the world, as reported by TOP500. Surpassing the initial performance forecasts set by its manufacturers, the supercomputer achieved a peak performance of 1.742 exaflops, exceeding the anticipated 1.5 exaflops target set by Cray Computing, now owned by HP.
Joining the ranks of Exascale-class supercomputers, El Capitan is capable of carrying out a quintillion calculations per second, securing its spot at the top of the TOP500 list. Following closely behind are the Frontier and Aurora supercomputers, claiming second and third place respectively. All three machines are housed in different US State Research Centers, with El Capitan at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Frontier at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and Aurora at the Argonne National Laboratory, all of which involved CRAY in their development.
Comprising over 11 million CPU and GPU cores, El Capitan’s architecture is powered by fourth-generation AMD EPYC processors, each equipped with AMD Instinct M1300A APU accelerators. Despite its immense power, the supercomputer boasts high energy efficiency, achieving 58.89 gigaflops per watt. El Capitan’s primary objectives include securing the US nuclear arsenal and combating nuclear terrorism, with experts predicting its continued dominance until even more powerful Exascale systems emerge.
Ranking fourth on the list is the Eagle cloud system from Microsoft Azure, boasting a capacity of 561.2 petaflops. Meanwhile, the newly installed European HPC6 supercomputer at the ENI S.P.A center in Italy secured fifth place, showcasing a speed of 477.90 petaflops, making it the fastest in Europe.
Among the top 10 systems, eight utilize AMD and Intel processors, with El Capitan, Frontier, HPC6, Lumi, and Tuolumne relying on AMD chips, while Aurora, Eagle, and Leonardo operate on Intel processors. Other solutions are also present, with ALPS using NVIDIA processors and Japan’s Fugaku utilizing its own ARM processors developed by Fujitsu.
Geographically, North America leads the pack with 181 systems, followed closely by Europe with 161 supercomputers. Asia houses 143 systems, with the United States now home to 173 supercomputers, while China’s presence decreased to 63. Germany is quickly catching up, boasting 41 supercomputers in the ranking