Vector Supercomputers: It’s Never too Late to Parallelise

Abstract

While most new manufacturers have built parallel computers by combining a large number of microprocessors in a single machine, the vector supercomputer manufacturers have been increasing the performance of their products by combining small numbers of vector processors. This approach, like that of the multiprocessor manufacturers described in Chapter 3, allows users to re-use much of their code, and much of their knowledge. While the age of the vector machine may now be past, multiprocessor vector computers will play an important role in the struggle for the high-end supercomputer market in the 1990s.