A small US chip-design firm has unveiled a new processor it says will transform ordinary desktop PCs and laptops into supercomputers. An ordinary desktop PC outfitted with six PCI cards, each containing four of ClearSpeed Technologies' CS301 chips, would perform at about 600 gigaflops. At this level of performance, the PC would qualify as one of the 500 most powerful supercomputers in the world.
The souped-up PC would cost about $25,000, ClearSpeed said. By comparison, most of the supercomputers on the Top 500 list are clusters of hundreds of processors and cost millions of dollars. ClearSpeed said the new chip is also very low-power, operating at about 2 watts, which would allow it to run off a laptop battery and would not require special cooling. The company said it will be providing prototypes to computer manufacturers by the end of the year.
