MIT builds Ubuntu ARM cluster with 96 cores, and solar panels

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Employees of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, together with technologiesite Phoronix, a Linux cluster is built, which consists of ninety-six ARM-cores. The efficient Ubuntu-cluster can run on solar energy.

The system was in the last weekend built on the MIT campus. To have the necessary capabilities to keep down was the small cluster built with ARM cores, to be found on experimenteerborden known as the PandaBoard ES. Each PandaBoard-module consists of two ARM Cortex A9 cores; two cores are derived from a TI OMAP4430-soc and run on 1.0 GHz. The OMAP-soc also has a 304MHz geklokte PowerVR SGX540 gpu on board. That is the same as the soc in Samsung’s Galaxy S II smartphone. The PandaBoard will cost about a hundred euros.

In total, for the cluster forty-eight PandaBoard boards, complete with wi-fi – and bluetooth-module, usb ports, audio, and network ports, and 1GB ddr2 memory on board. The power supply was via usb ports provided, and each PandaBoard took pleasure with about 3W idle and 5 or 6W under load. In total it took the system idle is around 170W and at average load more than 200W. Specifications of the solar panel to the energy yielded, gave the team yet. Neither are benchmarks of the cluster released. The system turned a for OMAP4-compiled ARM version of Ubuntu 12.04 from sd cards.