The TOP500 list highlights the most powerful supercomputers in the world. The number 1 system on the 39th TOP500 list is the Sequoia supercomputer at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the US, with a performance of 16.3 petaflops (quadrillions of calculations per second). Overall, US systems make up 5 of the top 10 systems and have the highest total performance of over 61 teraflops (trillions of calculations per second). China has the second highest total performance and Europe is third. Since the first TOP500 list in 1993, there has been exponential growth in supercomputer performance and the number of systems has replaced every 1.5 years on average.

1. Highlights of the 39th TOP500 List
ISC’12, Hamburg, Germany

2. 38th List: The TOP10 – Nov 11
Rmax Power
Rank Site Manufacturer Computer Country Cores
[Pflops] [MW]
RIKEN Advanced K Computer
1 Institute for Fujitsu SPARC64 VIIIfx 2.0GHz, Japan 795,024 10.51 12.66
Computational Science Tofu Interconnect
National Tianhe-1A
2 SuperComputer Center NUDT NUDT TH MPP, China 186,368 2.566 4.04
in Tianjin Xeon 6C, NVidia, FT-1000 8C
Oak Ridge National Jaguar
3 Cray USA 224,162 1.759 6.95
Laboratory Cray XT5, HC 2.6 GHz
National Nebulae
4 Supercomputing Centre Dawning TC3600 Blade, Intel X5650, China 120,640 1.271 2.58
in Shenzhen NVidia Tesla C2050 GPU
TSUBAME-2
GSIC, Tokyo Institute of
5 NEC/HP HP ProLiant, Xeon 6C, NVidia, Japan 73,278 1.192 1.40
Technology
Linux/Windows
Cielo
6 DOE/NNSA/LANL/SNL Cray USA 142,272 1.110 3.98
Cray XE6, 8C 2.4 GHz
NASA/Ames Research Pleiades
7 SGI USA 111,104 1.088 4.10
Center/NAS SGI Altix ICE 8200EX/8400EX
DOE/SC/ Hopper
8 Cray USA 153,408 1.054 2.91
LBNL/NERSC Cray XE6, 6C 2.1 GHz
Commissariat a Tera 100
9 l'Energie Atomique Bull Bull bullx super-node France 138.368 1.050 4.59
(CEA) S6010/S6030
Roadrunner
10 DOE/NNSA/LANL IBM USA 122,400 1.042 2.34
BladeCenter QS22/LS21

3. Rmax Power
#
1
Site
Lawrence Livermore
39th List: The TOP10
Manufacturer
IBM
Computer
Sequoia
BlueGene/Q,
Country
USA
Cores [Pflops] [MW]
1,572,864 16.3 7.89
National Laboratory
Power BQC 16C 1.6GHz, Custom
K Computer
RIKEN Advanced Institute
2 Fujitsu SPARC64 VIIIfx 2.0GHz, Japan 795,024 10.5 12.66
for Computational Science
Tofu Interconnect
Mira
Argonne National
3 IBM BlueGene/Q, USA 786,432 8.16 3.95
Laboratory
Power BQC 16C 1.6GHz, Custom
SuperMUC
4 Leibniz Rechenzentrum IBM iDataPlex DX360M4, Germany 147,456 2.90 3.52
Xeon E5 8C 2.7GHz, Infiniband FDR
Tianhe-1A
National SuperComputer
5 NUDT NUDT TH MPP, China 186,368 2.57 4.04
Center in Tianjin
Xeon 6C, NVidia, FT-1000 8C
Jaguar
Oak Ridge National
6 Cray Cray XK6, Opteron 16C 2.2GHz, USA 298,592 1.94 5.14
Laboratory
Gemini, NVIDIA 2090
Fermi
7 CINECA IBM BlueGene/Q, Italy 163,840 1.73 0.82
Power BQC 16C 1.6GHz, Custom
JuQUEEN
Forschungszentrum
8 IBM BlueGene/Q, Germany 131,072 1.38 0.66
Juelich (FZJ)
Power BQC 16C 1.6GHz, Custom
Commissariat a l'Energie Curie thin nodes
9 Atomique Bull Bullx B510, France 77,184 1.36 2.25
CEA/TGCC-GENCI Xeon E5 8C 2.7GHz, Infiniband QDR
Nebulae
National Supercomputing
10 Dawning TC3600 Blade, China 120,640 1.27 2.58
Centre in Shenzhen
Intel X5650, NVidia Tesla C2050 GPU

4. 0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
Replacement Rate
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
170
2012

5. Annual Performance Increase of the
TOP500
2.6
2.4
2.2
2
1.8
1.6
1.4
1.2
1
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
2010
2012

7. Performance Development
100 Pflop/s
1E+09 123 PFlop/s
10000000
10 Pflop/s
16.3 PFlop/s
10000000
1 Pflop/s
1000000
100 Tflop/s SUM 61 TFlop/s
100000
10 Tflop/s
10000
N=1
1 Tflop/s
1000 1.17 TFlop/s
100
100 Gflop/s
59.7 GFlop/s
10
10 Gflop/s
N=500
1
1 Gflop/s
0.1 400 MFlop/s
100 Mflop/s
2012
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
2010

8. Projected Performance Development
1E+11
1E+10
11E+09
Eflop/s
100 Pflop/s
10000000
10 Pflop/s
10000000
SUM
1 Pflop/s
1000000
100000
100 Tflop/s
10000
10 Tflop/s
N=1
1000
1 Tflop/s
100 100
Gflop/s N=500
10
10 Gflop/s
1
1 Gflop/s
0.1
100 Mflop/s
2020
1996
2002
2008
2014

9. Performance of Countries
100,000
US
10,000
Total Performance [Tflop/s]
EU
Japan
1,000
China
100
10
1
0
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
2010
2012

10. Countries / System Share
United States
Canada others China
2% Italy 12%
Japan
2%
United States United Kingdom
Germany
50% France
4%
France Germany
4% Canada
Japan Italy
United Kingdom 7% China others
5% 14%

11. 0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
Asian Countries
2010
2011
2012
India
China
Japan
Others
Korea, South

12. European Countries
200
180 Others
160 Poland
140 Russia
120 Spain
Systems
100 Sweden
80 Switzerland
60 Netherlands
Italy
40
France
20
United Kingdom
0
Germany
2001
2012
2000
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011

13. Vendors / System Share
Fujitsu Others
IBM
7 46
Oracle 9% HP
1%
7 Cray Inc.
Dell 1% IBM
Bull 213 Appro
12
16 43%
3% SGI
3%
SGI Bull
16 Dell
3% Oracle
Appro
19 Cray Inc. HP Fujitsu
4% 137 Others
27
6% 27%

14. Vendors (TOP50) / System Share
IBM
Cray Inc
Bull SA
Others
14 IBM Appro
28% 22 Others
44%
Appro
3 Cray Inc
6% 7
Bull SA
14%
4
8%

15. Processors / Systems
Xeon 5600-series (Westmere-EP)
2% 1% 1%
2% Xeon 5500-series (Nehalem-EP)
5%
3% Intel Xeon E5
3%
Opteron 6100 "Magny-Cours"
Power BQC
4%
Xeon 5400-series "Harpertown"
4% 49%
POWER7
6% Opteron 6200 Series "Interlagos"
Opteron Quad Core
9% POWER6
PowerPC 450
11%
PowerPC 440
others

16. Processors / Performance
Power BQC
2% 1% 1% 1%
Xeon 5600 (Westmere-EP)
3% 4%
Intel Xeon E5
3%
SPARC64 VIIIfx
28%
Opteron 6100 "Magny-Cours"
4%
Xeon 5500-series (Nehalem-EP)
5% Opteron 6200 "Interlagos"
POWER7
6%
Xeon 5400-series "Harpertown"
PowerPC 450
9%
Opteron Quad Core
22%
SPARC64 IXfx
11%
Xeon 5500-series (Nehalem-EX)
Others

17. Cores per Socket
500
450
400 16
350 12
300 10
Systems
250 9
200 8
150 6
4
100
2
50
1
0
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012

18. Cores per Socket
1 core
76 2
3 2 cores
4 cores
235 23
6 cores
64 8 cores
9 cores
36
10 cores
1 12 cores
16
16 cores
108

19. Accelerators/ Co-Processors
60
50
Intel MIC
40
Clearspeed CSX600
Systems
30 ATI GPU
IBM PowerXCell 8i
20 NVIDIA 2070
NVIDIA 2050
10 NVIDIA 2090
0
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012

20. Performance of Accelerators/Co-
Processors
18,000
16,000 Intel MIC
Total Performance [Tflop/s]
14,000 Clearspeed CSX600
12,000 ATI GPU
IBM PowerXCell 8i
10,000
NVIDIA 20702
8,000
NVIDIA 2090
6,000 NVIDIA 2050
4,000
2,000
0
2009
2006
2007
2008
2010
2011
2012

21. Linpack Efficiency
120%
100%
Linpack Efficiency
80%
60%
40%
20%
0%
0 100 200 300 400 500

22. Absolute Power Levels
13
12
11
10
Power [MWatts]
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0 100 200 300 400 500
TOP500 Rank

23. Power Consumption
5
TOP10
4
Power [MW]
3
TOP50
2
1 TOP500
0
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

24. Power Consumption
10
9 TOP10
8
7
Power [MW]
6
5
4 TOP50
3
2
1 TOP500
0

25. Power Efficiency
1200
Linpack/Power [Gflops/kW]
1000
800
TOP10
600
TOP50
400
200 TOP500
0
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

26. Power Efficiency
2,500 BlueGene/Q
Max-Efficiency
Linpack/Power [Gflops/kW]
2,000
1,500
Cell
1,000
TOP10
500
TOP50
0 TOP500
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

27. Most Power Efficient Architectures
Rmax/
Computer
Power
BlueGene/Q, Power BQC 16C 1.60 GHz, Custom 2,214
Bullx B505, Xeon E5649 6C 2.53GHz, Infiniband QDR, NVIDIA 2090 1,266
Intel Cluster, Xeon E5-2670 8C 2.600GHz, Infiniband FDR, Intel MIC 1,177
Xtreme-X , Xeon E5-2670 8C 2.600GHz, Infiniband QDR, NVIDIA 2090 1,050
SuperServer 2026GT-TRF, Xeon E5645 6C 2.40GHz, Infiniband QDR,
954
NVIDIA 2050
iDataPlex DX360M4, Xeon E5-2670 8C 2.600GHz, Infiniband FDR 933
Mole-8.5 Cluster, Xeon X5520 4C 2.27 GHz, Infiniband QDR, NVIDIA
919
2050
HP ProLiant SL390s G7 Xeon 6C X5660 2.8Ghz, nVidia Fermi,
902
Infiniband QDR
PRIMEHPC FX10, SPARC64 IXfx 16C 1.848GHz, Tofu interconnect 886
[Mflops/Watt]