Architecture
The Challenge is a shared-memory multiprocessor computer. The system is based on nodes, which are implemented as boards that plug into a midplane containing Ebus slots and the POWERpath-2 "Ebus" bus, a system bus that the nodes use to communicate with other nodes. The POWERpath-2 bus consists of a 256-bit path for data and a 40-bit path for addressing clocked at 47.6 MHz (21-nanosecond cycle), providing 1.2 GB/s of sustained bandwidth.
The midplane in DM and L models contains five Ebus slots that can support a combination of three CPU, one memory or two POWERchannel-2 interface boards. The midplane also contains five VME expansion slots.
The midplane in XL models contains fifteen Ebus slots that can support a combination of nine CPU, eight memory or five POWERchannel-2 interface boards. The midplane also contains six VME expansion slots and three power board slots.
Read more about this topic: SGI Challenge
Famous quotes containing the word architecture:
“No architecture is so haughty as that which is simple.”
—John Ruskin (1819–1900)
“Art is a jealous mistress, and, if a man have a genius for painting, poetry, music, architecture or philosophy, he makes a bad husband and an ill provider.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Polarized light showed the secret architecture of bodies; and when the second-sight of the mind is opened, now one color or form or gesture, and now another, has a pungency, as if a more interior ray had been emitted, disclosing its deep holdings in the frame of things.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)