Intel HPC Job Bank
HPC in the Cloud


Dedicated to covering high-end cloud computing
in science, industry and the datacenter

Language Flags

ASU Supercomputer Facility Chooses Panasas Storage Cluster


Arizona State University's (ASU) Fulton High-Performance Computing (HPC) Initiative Center provides researchers faster access to collaborative research information vital to solving complex scientific and engineering problems due to its adoption of the Panasas ActiveScale Storage Cluster. By deploying the Panasas ActiveScale Storage Cluster, ASU has increased its Linux cluster performance by 10 times while eliminating the need for costly NFS servers.

The HPC Initiative serves as a university hub for high-performance computing. ASU researchers use the facility's 200-node Linux cluster to study complex problems ranging from the design of golf balls that fly farther and straighter, to developing massively large numerical simulations that can lead to more accurate weather predictions. In building out the HPC Initiative Center, ASU recognized that reliance of legacy storage solutions would require multiple NFS servers to scale, realized this was not a viable solution, and selected Panasas to meet their increased performance requirements and their scalability needs.

"We evaluated several storage solutions with parallel file systems, knowing that a reliance on legacy NFS servers would not enable us to scale quickly or match the demands of our Linux cluster. Over time, adding more NFS servers would stifle the cluster's usability," said Dan Stanzione, director of the High Performance Computing Initiative. "In evaluation tests on 32- and 64-node test data, Panasas with DirectFLOW outpaced competitive storage solutions right out-of-the-box, without requiring any fine-tuning. Quite simply, we plugged in Panasas storage and it worked. It's reliable and remarkably fast."

The Panasas Storage Cluster with DirectFLOW provides a fully-parallel data path for high speed and direct communications between the facility's Linux cluster and Panasas storage, eliminating performance bottlenecks that can idle the cluster as it waits for data. Instead, Panasas storage optimizes the speed in which meaningful results can be processed and delivered.

In addition, Panasas' integrated hardware/software solution streamlines management tasks so that IT managers can be more productive and spend less time on tedious administrative tasks. The Panasas Storage Cluster also supports clustered NFS so that non-Linux nodes can access data running on the Linux cluster. This means that ASU faculty and students running applications from their Windows-based workstations can use the Panasas Storage Cluster to process their jobs directly on the Linux cluster. In this way, the facility can fully maximize IT investments in its infrastructure and reduce the overall cost of ownership.

"Panasas continues to shatter the myth that high-performance, scalable storage has to be complex," said Larry Jones, vice president of marketing at Panasas. "We're setting the standard for exceptional ease of use with the Panasas Storage Cluster and we've established DirectFLOW as the de facto standard benchmark in achieving the highest in clustered Linux storage performance for use in universities such as ASU as well as government, and commercial organizations."

Most Read Features

Most Read Around the Web

Most Read This Just In

Most Read Blogs


Feature Articles

SLA-Aware Scheduling and Virtual Efficiency

Researchers from the Suddhananda Engineering and Research Centre in Bhubaneswar, India developed a job scheduling system, which they call Service Level Agreement (SLA) scheduling, that is meant to achieve acceptable methods of resource provisioning similar to that of potential in-house systems. They combined that with an on-demand resource provisioner to ensure utilization optimization of virtual machines.
Read more...

CloudSigma CEO Elaborates on Science Cloud

Experimental scientific HPC applications are continually being moved to the cloud, as covered here in several capacities over the last couple of weeks. Included in that rundown, Co-founder and CEO of CloudSigma Robert Jenkins penned an article for HPC in the Cloud where he discussed the emergence of cloud technologies to supplement research capabilities of big scientific initiatives like CERN and ESA (the European Space Agency)...
Read more...

Examining Questions of Virtualization and Security in the Cloud

When considering moving excess or experimental HPC applications to a cloud environment, there will always be obstacles. Were that not the case, the cost effectiveness of cloud-based HPC would rule the high performance landscape. Jonathan Stewart Ward and Adam Barker of the University of St. Andrews produced an intriguing report on the state of cloud computing, paying a significant amount of attention to the problems facing cloud computing.
Read more...

Short Takes

Datapipe and Verne Global's Green Cloud

Jun 17, 2013 | With that in mind, Datapipe hopes to establish themselves as a green-savvy HPC cloud provider with their recently announced Stratosphere platform. Datapipe markets Stratosphere as a green HPC cloud service and in doing so partnering with Verne Global and their Icelandic datacenter, which is known for its propensity in green computing.
Read more...

IBM's Guide to Cloud Based HPC

Jun 12, 2013 | Cloud computing is gaining ground in utilization by mid-sized institutions who are looking to expand their experimental high performance computing resources. As such, IBM released what they call Redbooks, in part to assist institutions’ movement of high performance computing applications to the cloud.
Read more...

OpenStack and the SDSC Research Cloud

Jun 06, 2013 | The San Diego Supercomputer Center launched a public cloud system for universities in the area designed specifically to run on commodity hardware with high performance solid-state drives. The center, which currently holds 5.5 PB of raw storage, is open to educational and research users in the University of California.
Read more...

Sponsored Whitepapers

Best Practices in Big Data Storage

05/10/2013 | Cleversafe, Cray, DDN, NetApp, & Panasas | From Wall Street to Hollywood, drug discovery to homeland security, companies and organizations of all sizes and stripes are coming face to face with the challenges – and opportunities – afforded by Big Data. Before anyone can utilize these extraordinary data repositories, however, they must first harness and manage their data stores, and do so utilizing technologies that underscore affordability, security, and scalability.

Exploring the Potential of Heterogeneous Computing

04/02/2012 | AMD | Developers today are just beginning to explore the potential of heterogeneous computing, but the potential for this new paradigm is huge. This brief article reviews how the technology might impact a range of application development areas, including client experiences and cloud-based data management. As platforms like OpenCL continue to evolve, the benefits of heterogeneous computing will become even more accessible. Use this quick article to jump-start your own thinking on heterogeneous computing.

Sponsored Multimedias

Newsletters

Stay informed! Subscribe to HPC in the Cloud email Newsletters.

HPC in the Cloud Update
HPCwire Weekly Update
Digital Manufacturing Report
Datanami
HPCwire Conferences & Events
Job Bank
HPCwire Product Showcases


HPC Wall Street 2013

HPC Job Bank


Featured Events




  • November 17, 2013 - November 22, 2013
    SC'13
    Denver, CO
    United States


HPC in the Cloud Conferences & Events