System X (pronounced "System Ten") was a supercomputer assembled by Virginia Tech's Advanced Research Computing facility in the summer of 2003. Costing US$5.2 million, it was originally composed of 1,100 ApplePower Mac G5 computers with dual 2.0 GHz processors. System X was decommissioned on May 21, 2012.
System X ran at 12.25 Teraflops, (20.24 peak), and was ranked #3 on November 16, 2003 and #280 in the July 2008 edition of the TOP500 list of the world's most powerful supercomputers. The system used error-correcting RAM, which is important for accuracy due to the rate of bits flipped by cosmic rays or other interference sources in its vast number of RAM chips.
Background
The supercomputer's name originates from the use of the Mac OS Xoperating system for each node, and because it was the first university computer to achieve 10 teraflops on the high performance LINPACK benchmark. The supercomputer is also known as ‘Big Mac’ or ‘Terascale Cluster’. In 2003 it was also touted as “the world’s most powerful and cheapest homebuilt supercomputer.” System X was constructed with a relatively low budget of just $5.2 million, in the span of only three months, thanks in large part to using off-the-shelf Power Mac G5 computers. By comparison, the Earth Simulator, the fastest supercomputer at the time, cost approximately $400 million to build.
System X was the 2nd national digitaltelephone exchange system to be used in the United Kingdom. The first was a UXD5-Glenkindie Scotland 1979.
History
Development
System X was developed by the UK Post Office (later to become British Telecom), GEC, Plessey, and Standard Telephones and Cables (STC) and first shown in public in 1979 at the Telecom 79 exhibition in Geneva Switzerland. In 1982, STC withdrew from System X and, in 1988, the telecommunications divisions of GEC & Plessey merged to form GPT, with Plessey subsequently being bought out by GEC & Siemens. In the late 1990s, GEC acquired Siemens' 40% stake in GPT and, in 1999, the parent company of GPT, GEC, renamed itself Marconi.
When Marconi was sold to Ericsson in January 2006, Telent plc retained System X and continues to support and develop it as part of its UK services business.
Implementation
The first System X unit to enter public service was in September 1980 and was installed in Baynard House, London and was a tandem junction unit which switched telephone calls amongst around 40 local exchanges. The first local digital exchange started operation in 1981 in Woodbridge, Suffolk (near BT's Research HQ at Martlesham Heath). The last electromechanical trunk exchange (in Thurso, Scotland) was closed in July 1990—completing the UK's trunk network transition to purely digital operation and becoming the first national telephone system to achieve this. The last electromechanical local exchanges, Crawford, Crawfordjohn and Elvanfoot, all in Scotland, were changed over to digital on 23 June 1995 and the last electronic analogue exchanges, Selby, Yorkshire and Leigh on Sea, Essex were changed to digital on 11 March 1998.
Chris Impellitteri formed Impellitteri together with Rob Rock in Los Angeles, California. They released an EP simply titled Impellitteri. The self-titled EP featured high energy energetic heavy metal with fast guitar solos. Vocalist for the EP was Rob Rock.
After the EP the band regrouped, this time with Graham Bonnet as lead singer, and released A semi-tribute album to the more famous metal vocalists of the era titled Stand In Line. MTV played Impellitteri's music video for Stand In Line in its rotation, and Chris Impellitteri was a guest host on MTV's Headbanger's Ball. The fans voted Impellitteri a smash on MTV's Smash or Trash show featured during the release of the album. The album charted in Billboards top 100 and remained there for over 5 months. However, Impellitteri stated The Black EP was Impellitteri's style of music, and Stand in line was only intended to be a tribute to the legendary vocalists of the past's music, and not as a traditional Impellitteri metal shred record. Impellitteri has submitted copyright claims to YouTube for postings of live footage from this era.
Especially if you don’t want to install any additional software or have computers with operating systems other than Windows...It’s basically a simple server computer in a multi-hard drive enclosure, which comes with a customized operating system.
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As the Director of Pharmacy, Morris is busy reviewing patient charts, collaborating with medical providers, verifying medication orders, purchasing meds, and maintaining the pharmacy computer system, among other responsibilities ... .
