Press Release

SGI Altix Systems Make Giant Leap to 21 Terabytes of Globally Addressable Memory at Customer Sites

Silicon Graphics Ultra Large Shared Memory Capability Enables New Algorithms and Boosts Productivity for Critical Applications

SUNNYVALE, Calif. (February 10, 2008) — Silicon Graphics, Inc. (SGI) (NASDAQ: SGIC) is in a category all by itself when it comes to massive globally shared main memory and globally addressable memory on SGI® Altix® 4700 systems. With numerous installations in the 4TB range, and a number more in the 8TB range, the groundbreaking scalability of SGI systems extends to 21TB of globally addressable main memory at customer sites. This is over five times the size of memory that other vendors can offer today. The system is designed to accommodate 128 terabytes of globally shared memory under the control of a single instance of the Linux operating system! The system may also be partitioned among multiple instances of Linux and provide globally addressable shared memory among OS instances via SGI's unique NUMAlink® interconnect technology.

Large global shared memory saves time: time-to-results, time-to-solution and time-to-innovation. It significantly simplifies application development and debugging for all multi-threaded applications but is mandatory for several categories of applications including memory-resident data base applications with uses in Internet data centers and transaction processing, as well as those based on "graph theory," an important area of mathematics with uses in defense and homeland security applications, multi-disciplinary science, and data assimilation.

"There are applications emerging in the market that require extremely large shared memory: one such application area is graph theory," said Dr. Eng Lim Goh, senior vice president and chief technology officer, Silicon Graphics, Inc. "In addition, the study of complicated networks and relationships between objects in business or scientific computing require the ability to put the entire database or model into memory to analyze and/or compute. Some of these applications demand an SGI Altix system, which is the only server that offers sufficiently large shared memory capability to achieve such large scale endeavors."

The power of SGI's largest global shared memory and globally addressable memory capabilities has been adopted by a number of strategic customers for their projects, including:

  • Northrop Grumman Corporation recently added two SGI Altix 4700 systems, each with 128 Intel® Itanium® processors that leverages the unique memory-only blade design of the Altix family of systems, and 5TB of shared main memory. Northrop Grumman now has a total of 11TB of global shared memory on SGI Altix systems at this secure site.
  • At Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, the Air Force Research Laboratory uses an SGI Altix 4700 system packed with 4,608 Intel Itanium processors in a single supercomputer equipped with 20 TB of globally addressable memory and 440 TB of usable disk space. Globally addressable memory means applications can be shared across various operating systems via SGI NUMAlink. One of the largest computers in the Department of Defense, the SGI resource helps DoD researchers to design faster, reduce risk by increasing the quality of modeling and simulation, and support an intensifying effort to develop "game-changing" computational science and engineering applications. The Air Force Research Laboratory is part of the DoD's High Performance Computing Modernization Program (HPCMP), which provides the supercomputer services, high-speed network communications, and computational science expertise that enables Army, Air Force, and Navy laboratories and test centers to conduct a wide range of focused research, development, and test activities.

    The DoD's SGI Altix system offers major advantages to an array of projects, such as computational fluid dynamics studies designed to reduce the risks posed by turbulence on aircraft carrier decks. With access to more power and memory from the Altix system, DoD researchers can more quickly and accurately modify carrier designs that minimize the ship's airwake - and with it, the danger to pilots.

  • The Leibniz Supercomputing Centre Munich (LRZ), which houses one of Germany's National Supercomputer Systems, employs a record-breaking SGI Altix 4700 system. Starting in late 2006, the first Altix 4700 installation marked the completion of LRZ's Phase I deployment, which incorporated 2,048 Intel Itanium processors with 17 TB of globally addressable memory. The LRZ system operates all 4,096 processors as a unified platform that enables applications to directly address all 17 TB of memory. In 2007, a 4,864 Intel Itanium processor system at LRZ with slightly over 39 TB of globally addressable memory completed Phase II. Available to scientists in Germany and Europe, the SGI Altix system is hard at work solving increasingly complex simulations in physics and astrophysics, materials research, fluid dynamics, chemistry, geosciences and biological sciences.

"Intel has a successful track record delivering highly reliable and scalable Itanium processors enabling mission critical, data intensive solutions," said Susan Tauzer, Director of Mission Critical Platform Marketing, Intel Corporation. "SGI's Altix HPC system based on the Intel Itanium architecture delivers an innovative tera-scale computing solution for scientific research and business analytics."

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Silicon Graphics, Inc.
Silicon Graphics, Inc. (SGI) (NASDAQ: SGIC), is a leader in high-performance computing. SGI delivers a complete range of high-performance server, visualization, and storage solutions along with industry-leading professional services and support that enable its customers to overcome the challenges of complex data-intensive workflows and accelerate breakthrough discoveries, innovation and information transformation. SGI solutions help customers solve their computing challenges whether it's enhancing the quality of life through drug research, designing and manufacturing safer and more efficient cars and airplanes, studying global climate, providing technologies for homeland security and defense, or helping enterprises manage large data. With offices worldwide, the company is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, and can be found on the Web at www.sgi.com.

Note: The new main phone number for SGI corporate headquarters is 408-524-1980.

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