INFOBrief

Dell PowerEdge SC1425 High Performance Computing Clusters

Key Points

  • Third generation of Dell’s High Performance Computing Cluster (HPCC) provides computational-intensive capacity leveraging the latest technology available in the market.
  • Dell PowerEdge SC1425 HPC cluster is based on the PowerEdge SC1425 server, which is ideal for high performance computing environment, where reliability, raw performance and low cost are the most important factors in choosing a compute server.
  • HPCC is a cost effective method for delivering a parallel computing system platform, targeted towards compute- and data-intensive applications.
  • Through Dell HPCC, users can aggregate standards-based server and storage resources into powerful supercomputers to provide an inexpensive yet powerful solution.
  • High Performance Computing Clusters (HPCCs) are popular methods for solving these complex problems because of their low price points and excellent scalability.
  • Dell helps provide investment protection by offering solutions based on industry standard building blocks that can be re-deployed as traditional application servers as users integrate newer technology into their network infrastructures.
  • Dell delivers high-volume, standards-based solutions into scientific and compute-intensive environments that can benefit from economies-of-scale, and add systems as requirements change.
  • Dell’s technology and methodology are designed to provide high reliability, price/performance leadership, easy scalability and simplicity by bundling order codes for hardware, software and support services for 8, 16, 32, 64, 128 and 256 node clusters.

Product Description

The concept of HPCC or “Beowulf” (the project name used by original designers) clusters originated at the Center of Excellence in Space Data and Information Sciences (CESDIS), located at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland. The project’s goal was to design a cost-effective, parallel computing cluster built from off-the-shelf components that would satisfy the computational requirements of the earth and space sciences community.

As cluster solutions have gained acceptance for solving complex computing problems, High Performance Computing Clusters (HPCC) are starting to replace supercomputers in this role. The cost of commodity HPCC systems has changed a purchase decision from evaluating expensive proprietary solutions, where cost was not the primary issue, to evaluating vendors based on their ability to deliver exceptional price-to-performance ratios and support capabilities.

Logical View of a High Performance Computing Cluster

The strategy behind parallel computing is to “divide and conquer.” By dividing a complex problem into smaller component tasks that can be worked on simultaneously, the problem can often be solved more quickly. This can help save time and resources, as well as monetary costs. Dell’s HPCC uses a multi-computer architecture, as depicted in Figure 1. It features a parallel computing system that consists of one master node and multiple compute nodes connected via standard network interconnects. All of the server nodes in a typical HPCC run an industry standard operating system, which typically offers substantial savings over proprietary operating systems.

The master node of the cluster acts as a server for the Network File System (NFS), job-scheduling tasks, security, and acting as a gateway to end-users. The master node assigns each of the compute nodes with one or more tasks to perform as the larger task is broken into sub-functions. As a gateway, the master node allows users to gain access to the compute nodes.

The sole task of the compute nodes is to execute assigned tasks in parallel. A compute node does not have a keyboard, mouse, video card, or monitor. Access to client nodes is provided via remote connections through the master node.

From a user's perspective, a HPCC appears as a Massively Parallel Processor (MPP) system. Common methods of using the system are to access the master node either directly or through Telnet or remote login from personal workstations. Once logged onto the master node, users can prepare and compile their parallel applications and spawn jobs on a desired number of compute nodes in the cluster.

In addition to compute nodes and master nodes, key components of HPCC include: systems management utilities, applications, file systems, interconnects, and storage and software solution stacks.

  • Dell Server Assistant for PowerEdgeSC
    BecauseHPCC systems can consist of many nodes, it is important to be able to monitor and manage these nodes from a single console. It is possible to have thousands of nodes within one cluster. To help manage such a sizable cluster, Dell Server Assistant for PowerEdge SC provides update utility for BIOS, firmware and drivers, system management utility, baseboard management utilities for remote BMC (base management controller) management and system configuration utility to set up BIOS and BMC parameters.

The integrated base management controller (BMC) for system monitoring and management is IPMI 1.5 compliant.

  • Applications
    Applications may be written to run in parallel on multiple systems and use the message-passing programming model. Jobs of a parallel application are spawned on compute nodes, which work collaboratively until the jobs are complete. During the execution, compute nodes use standard message-passing middleware to coordinate activities and information passing.
  • Parallel Virtual File System
    A Parallel Virtual File System (PVFS) is used as a high-performance, large parallel file system for temporary storage and as an infrastructure for parallel I/O research. PVFS stores data on the existing local file systems of multiple cluster nodes, enabling many clients access to the data simultaneously. Within a HPC cluster, PVFS enables high-performance I/O that is comparable to that of other proprietary file systems.
  • Interconnect
    To communicate with each other, the cluster nodes are connected through a network. The interconnect technology chosen depends on the amount of interaction between nodes when an application is executed. Some applications are similar to batch environments, and the communication between compute nodes is limited. For these environments, Fast Ethernet may be adequate. However, in environments that require more frequent communication, a Gigabit Ethernet interconnect is preferable.

Some application environments can also benefit from a special interconnect that has been designed to provide high-speed and low latency between the compute nodes. For these applications, Dell’s bundles are available with Myricom’s Myrinet and Topspin’s Infiniband products.

  • High Performance Computing Cluster Solution Stack
    Dell partners with service providers to deliver the software components necessary for implementing a HPCC solution. The HPCC stack includes the job-scheduler, cluster management, message passing libraries, and compilers.

High Performance Computing Market

Target markets for high performance computing clusters are: higher education, large corporations, federal government, and technology sectors that require high performance computational computing. Industry examples include: oil and gas, aerospace, automotive, chemistry, national security, financial and pharmaceutical.

Typical high computation applications include: war and airline simulations, financial modeling, molecular modeling, fluid dynamics, circuit board design, ocean flow analysis, seismic data filtering, and visualizations.

Applications that use HPC clusters and their specific vertical markets can be found in Table 1.

Table 1

Vertical Markets Appropriate for HPCC

Vertical / Description of Requirements / Typical Applications
Manufacturing / Crash worthiness, stress analysis, shock and vibe, aerodynamics / Fluent, Radioss, Nastran, Ansys, Powerflow
Energy / Seismic processing, geophysical modeling, reservoir modeling / VIP, Eclipse, Vertias
Life Sciences / Drug design, bioinformatics, DNA mapping, disease research / Blast, Charmn, NAMD, PC-Gamess, Gaussian
Digital Media / Render Farms / Renderman, Discreet
Finance / Portfolio Management (Monte Carlo simulation), risk analysis / Barra, RMG, Sungard

Although market opportunities exist in environments made up of thousands of nodes, standard HPCC configurations target the majority of clusters within the 8-node to 256-node configuration range. Customers investigating larger cluster configurations should contact the Dell Professional Services organization for assistance.

Dell’s bundled HPCC solutions target customers with varying levels of expertise, from complete turnkey solutions -- including hardware and software - to easy-to-order hardware-only bundles. For those who do require a complete solution, Dell also offers consulting assistance and implementation services.

Features and Benefits

Dual Xeon processors with up to 3.6GHz clock speeds 800MHz FSB and 1MB L2 cache and EM64T support

The Dell High Performance Computing Cluster leverages many advantages of Dell’s product line, including server, storage, peripheral, and services components. By creating standard product offerings, Dell solutions are designed to help minimize configuration complexity. These standard packages consist of 8, 16, 32, 64 and 256 node configurations.

The key technology features of a Dell High Performance Computing cluster configuration are shown in Table 2.

Table 2

The Key Technology Features of a Dell HPCC Configuration

Feature / Function / Benefit
Full featured hardware configurations / Pre-bundled order codes for 8 node, 16 node, 32 node, 64 node 128 and 256 node configurations; 16 – 512 CPU configurations / Simplified ordering process and pre-qualified configurations
PowerEdge™ SC1425 (Compute Node) /
  • Dual Intel®Xeon™ processors at 2.0, 2.8GHz, 3.2GHz, 3.4GHz and 3.6 GHz clock speed with 800MHz FSB, 1 MB L2 cache, and EM64T support, providing highest performance
  • Intel 7250 chipset with dual Channel memory architecture (up to 6.4 GB/s memory bandwidth) for improved system performance
  • 1U form factor
  • 1 64-bit/133MHz PCI-x I/O slot
  • 2 GB Memory (expandable to 8GB), DDR 400 MHz SDRAM
  • Dual-embedded Gigabit NICs
  • Configurable sized drives (expandable to 2 drives) for internal storage
  • SCSI and SATA drives
/
  • High performance compute node for the most challenging applications
  • High density enables large compute clusters in a rack
  • Helps to minimize I/O bottlenecks
  • Flexibility for increasing storage capacity on compute node

PowerEdge 1850 (Master Node) /
  • Dual Intel®Xeon™ processors at 2.8GHz, 3.06GHz, 3.2GHz, 3.4GHz and 3.6 Ghz clockspeed with 800MHz FSB, 1 MB L2 cache, and EM64T support, providing highest performance
  • Intel 7250 chipset with dual Channel memory architecture (up to 6.4 GB/s memory bandwidth) for improved system performance
  • 1U form factor
  • 2 slots on separate I/O buses (2 PCI-x slots or 2 PCI- Express slots)
  • Dual Embedded Gigabit NICs
  • Management port for optional integrated DRAC4/I remote management card
  • 2 GB Memory (expandable to 12GB), DDR 400 MHz SDRAM
  • Configurable sized drives (expandable to 2 drives) for internal storage
  • U320 SCSI drives (hot plug)
/
  • High performance and highly available server in dense form factor

Interconnect – Options
Gigabit Ethernet – Highperformance
OR
Myrinet – High Speed Low Latency
OR
Topspin Infiniband – High Speed Low Latency / The interconnect technologies in a HPCC configuration allow servers to communicate with each other for node-to-node communications. / The interconnect technology is designed for message passing between the nodes. Offering Gigabit Ethernet enables customers to choose between a low cost or higher performance solution.
Myrinet and Topspin Infiniband provide high speed low latency interconnects for application environments that require frequent node-to-node communication.
Storage Device Options / PowerVault™ 220S SCSI external storage device on the Master Node for primary storage
OR
Dell |EMC CX300, CX500, CX700 Fibre channel arrays on the master node for primary storage / Provides a cost effective method for a large amount of external storage capabilities that can be allocated across multiple channels for maximized I/O performance
Headless Operation / The ability to operate a system without keyboard, video or mouse (KVM) / Simplifies cable management and helps lower cost of solution by eliminating monitors, keyboards and mouse
Operating System software pre-install / Factory installation of Red Hat Linux operating system / Facilitates setup of cluster configuration
Provides the capability to remotely power-on compute nodes over the Ethernet network / Remote management tool that can reduce system management workload, provide flexibility to the system administrator's job, and help save time-consuming effort and costs.
HPCC Software Solution Stack
(please see HPCC Software Stack Infobrief for more details) / Cluster Manager
Job Schedulers
MKL libraries, BLAS Atlas
MPI libraries / Dell tested tools for creating system environment for parallel computing infrastructure
Server Management / The Baseboard management controller (BMC) along with the Baseboard Management Utility (IPMISH, SOL Proxy) can be used to read the remote server status and system event log, remote power on and off of servers. / Detects and remedies problems within the cluster.

Key Customer Benefits

The performance of commodity computers and network hardware continually improves as new technology is introduced and implemented. At the same time, market conditions have led to decreases in the price of these components. As a result, it is now practical to build parallel computational systems based on low-cost, high-density servers, such as the Dell PowerEdge SC1425, rather than buy CPU time on expensive supercomputers. Dell PowerEdge servers are tuned to take advantage of the existing server/OS/application combination. Dell PowerEdge server performance and price/performance are typically among the industry leaders on a variety of benchmark standard scales (TPC-C, TPC-W; SPECweb99).

Low cost and high performance are only two of the advantages of using a Dell High Performance Computing Cluster solution. Other key benefits of HPCC versus large Symmetric Multi Processors (SMP) are shown in Table 3.

Table 3

Comparison of SMP and HPCC Environments

The features compared in Table 3 are defined as follows:

  • Scalability: The ability to grow in overall capacity and to meet higher usage demand as needed. When additional computational resources are needed, servers can be added to the cluster. Clusters can consist of thousands of servers.
  • Availability: The access to compute resources. To help ensure high availability, it is necessary to remove any single point of failure in the hardware and software. This helps to ensure that any individual system component, the system as a whole, or the solution (i.e., multiple systems) stay continuously available. A HPCC solution offers high availability because the components can be isolated and, in many cases, the loss of a compute node in the cluster does not have a large impact on the overall cluster solution. The workload of that node is allocated among the remaining compute nodes.
  • Ease of Technology Refresh: Integrating a new processor, memory, disk, or operating system technology can be accomplished with relative ease. In HPCC, as technology moves forward, modular pieces of the solution stack can be replaced as time, budget and needs require or permit. There is no need for a one-time 'switch-over' to the latest technology. In addition, new technology is often integrated more quickly into standards-based volume servers than proprietary system providers.
  • Service and Support: Total cost of ownership – including post-sales costs of maintaining the hardware and software – from standard upgrades to unit replacement to staff training and education, is generally much lower when compared to proprietary implementations that typically come with a high level of technical services due to their inherently complex nature and sophistication.
  • Vendor Lock-in: Proprietary solutions require a commitment to a particular vendor, whereas industry-standard implementations are interchangeable. Many proprietary solutions require only components that have been developed by that vendor. Depending on the revision and technology, application performance may be diminished. HPCC enables solutions to be built from the best-performing industry standard components.
  • System Manageability: System management is the installation, configuration and monitoring of key elements of computer systems, such as hardware, operating system and applications. Most large SMPs have proprietary enabling technologies (custom hardware extension and software components) that can complicate the system management. On the other hand, it is easier to manage one large system compared to hundreds of nodes. However, with wide deployment of network infrastructure and enterprise management software, it is possible to easily manage multiple servers of a HPCC system from a single point.
  • Reusability of Components: Commodity components can be reused when off line, therefore preserving a customer’s investment. In the future, when refreshing a Dell HPCC PowerEdge solution with next generation platforms, the older Dell PowerEdge compute nodes can be deployed as File/Print servers, Web Servers or other infrastructure servers.
  • Installation: Specialized equipment generally requires expert installation teams trained to handle such cases. They also require dedicated facilities such as power, cooling, etc. For HPCC, since the components are “off-the-shelf” commodities, installation is generic and widely supported.

Hardware Options

The High Performance Computing Cluster configurations can be enhanced in the following ways:

  • Increased memory in the compute nodes
  • Increased internal HDD storage capacity in the compute nodes
  • Increased external storage on the master node
  • Additional NICs for the compute nodes and master node
  • Through Dell Professional Services’ recommendations on faster interconnect technologies

Related Web Sites

Service and Support

Dell HPCC systems come with the following:

  • Three year limited warranty2 and three years of standard Next Business Day (NBD) parts replacement and one year of NBD on-site3 labor
  • 30-day “Getting Started” help line4
  • DirectLine network operating system support upgrades available with three-year limited warranty2
  • Telephone support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year for the duration of the three-year limited warranty2.

Dell Professional Services offers additional services to assist in: