Supercomputer Is Made Of PlayStation Consoles
遊戲主機變身超級電腦
By Laura Parker

Gaurav Khanna noticed that the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth physics department was more crowded than usual. Why, he wondered, were so many students suddenly so interested in science?
卡納注意到達特茅斯麻州大學物理系比平常擁擠，納悶為何有這麼多學生突然對科學如此感興趣。

It turns out that news of Dr. Khanna’s success in building a supercomputer using only PlayStation 3 video game consoles had spread quickly last spring; the students just wanted to see nearly 200 consoles stacked on one another.
原來，去年春天卡納博士只用PlayStation 3電玩主機就做成超級電腦的消息傳得很快，這些學生只是想看看近200個主機堆疊的樣子。

A black hole physicist and associate director of the university’s Center for Scientific Computing and Visualization Research, Dr. Khanna first networked 16 PlayStation 3 consoles in 2007 to help model black hole collisions.
卡納博士是黑洞物理學家和該校「科學計算與視覺化研究中心」副主任，2007年首度連結16個PS 3主機建立黑洞撞擊模型。

His research is focused on gravitational waves, vibrations that ripple through space-time. The waves, first predicted by Einstein’s theory of general relativity, form after a violent astrophysical event, like two black holes smashing together. Because black holes cannot be observed through telescopes, Dr. Khanna uses supercomputers to create simulations of these collisions.
他的研究以重力波為主。這是種傳遍時空的振動，愛因斯坦的廣義相對論最先推測它的存在，它在二黑洞互撞之類激烈天體物理事件後形成。由於黑洞無法以望遠鏡觀察，卡納便用超級電腦模擬這類撞擊。

Scientists and engineers rely on supercomputers to solve calculations too large for one processor to attempt.
科學家和工程師靠超級電腦解決單一處理器無法應付的龐大計算問題。

Making a supercomputer requires a large number of processors – standard desktops, laptops or the like – and a way to network them. Dr. Khanna picked the PlayStation 3 for its viability and cost, currently, $250 to $300 in stores. Unlike other game consoles, the PlayStation 3 allows users to install a preferred operating system.
製作超級電腦需要大量處理器（標準桌上型電腦、筆電之屬）和連結處理器的方法。卡納選擇PS 3因它物美價廉，目前為250到300美元。它不同於其他遊戲主機，可安裝喜愛的作業系統。

“Gaming had grown into a huge market,” Dr. Khanna said. “There’s a huge push for performance, meaning you can buy low-cost, high-performance hardware very easily. I could go out and buy 100 PlayStation 3 consoles.”
卡納說：「電玩已發展成巨大市場，對主機性能要求超高，也就是很容易買到低價格、高性能的硬體。我大可出門去買100個PS 3主機。」

The National Science Foundation, which funds much of Dr. Khanna’s research, might not have viewed the bulk buying of video game consoles as a responsible use of grant money, so he reached out to Sony Computer Entertainment America, the company behind the PlayStation 3, which donated four consoles; the university paid for eight, and Dr. Khanna bought another four. He then installed the Linux operating system on each and plugged them into the Internet.
國家科學基金會補助卡納許多研究經費，可能會認為用補助款大買電玩主機不負責任，因此卡納聯絡PS 3廠商「美國索尼電腦娛樂」，說服它捐出四個主機，校方買了八個，卡納自己買四個，給主機全安裝Linux作業系統，連上網。

In 2009, Dr. Khanna published a paper in the journal Parallel and Distributed Computing and Systems demonstrating the cell processor of the PlayStation 3 was able to speed up scientific calculations over a traditional computer processor by a factor of nearly 10. The first results of simulations made using the PlayStation 3 supercomputer were published the same year in the journal Classical and Quantum Gravity.
2009年卡納在「平行與分散式計算及系統」期刊發表論文，揭示PS 3的微處理器能讓傳統電腦處理器的科學計算速度乎增至十倍。同年，用PS 3超級電腦模擬出的第一批結果發表於「古典和量子重力」期刊。

Dr. Khanna’s observations caught the attention of the Air Force Research Laboratory in Rome, New York. In 2010, the lab built its own PlayStation 3 supercomputer using 1,716 consoles to conduct radar image processing for urban surveillance.
卡納的觀察結果引起紐約州羅馬市「美國空軍研究實驗室」注意。2010年，實驗室用1716個主機做出自己的PS 3超級電腦，處理城市監測雷達影像。

Later the lab donated 176 PlayStation 3 consoles to Dr. Khanna’s team, which linked the consoles and housing them in a refrigerated shipping container. The resulting supercomputer, he said, had the computational power of nearly 3,000 laptop or desktop processors, and cost only $75,000 to make – about a tenth the cost of a comparable supercomputer made using traditional parts.
後來，實驗室捐了176個PS 3主機給卡納的團隊，團隊把這些主機連結起來，放在一個冷藏貨櫃裡。卡納說，這樣做成的超級電腦運算能力相當於近3000個筆電或桌電處理器，製作成本僅7.5萬美元，約是運算能力相當的傳統超級電腦的十分之一。

Dr. Khanna has invited colleagues from other departments to use the supercomputer: An engineering team, for example, has signed on to conduct simulations that will help design better windmill blades and ocean wave energy converters.
卡納已邀請其他系所同仁使用這台超級電腦，例如，有個工程學團隊已登記要用電腦模擬，設計更好的風力發電機葉片和波浪能轉換器。

The PlayStation 3 supercomputer’s main limitation is memory. An alternative is to switch to a better processor, like PC graphics cards. These are low-cost and extremely powerful – each card is the equivalent of 20 PlayStation 3 consoles in terms of performance.
PS 3超級電腦的最大限制是記憶容量不足，替代方案是改用更好的處理器，如個人電腦顯示卡，價格低，功能又超強，每張顯示卡的性能等於20個PS 3主機。

“The next supercomputer we’re going to build will probably be made entirely of these cards,” Dr. Khanna said.
卡納博士說：「我們要做的下一台超級電腦大概全用顯示卡組成。」

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/23/science/an-economical-way-to-save-progress.html

2015-01-13聯合報/G5版/UNITED DAILY NEWS 李京倫譯 原文參見紐時週報十版左