IDC: Sites employing co-processors or accelerators in HPCs doubled

IDC reports the proportion of high performance computing (HPC) sites employing co-processors and accelerators more than doubled during the past two years, and a surprising two thirds of HPC sites are now performing Big Data analysis as part of their HPC workloads. IDC said the 2013 study included sites representing 905 HPC systems, more than double the 488 systems profiled in the 2011 version of the study, IDC announced at the International Supercomputing Conference in Leipzig. Highlights shared by IDC from the study includes: The proportion of sites employing co-processors or accelerators in their HPC systems jumped from 28.2% in the 2011 version of the study to 76.9% in 2013. Co-processors/accelerators advanced from slightly more than 1% of all processor parts in 2011 to 3.4% in 2013, with Intel Xeon Phi co-processors and NVIDIA GPUs running neck and neck for leadership, and FPGAs in a respectable third-place position. The use of co-processors and accelerators is still wider than it is deep, meaning that these newer devices have entered many more sites but are often still used for exploratory purposes. 67% of the sites in the 2013 study said they perform Big Data analysis on their HPC systems, with 30% of the available computing cycles devoted on average to Big Data analysis work. IDC did not ask about Big Data analysis in the 2011 version of the study. The 2013 end-us...