Supercomputer on a Chip Nears Completion

By David Worthington | Published September 16, 2004, 10:46 PM

According to the Nikkei Journal Toshiba president Tadashi Okamura has confirmed that the designs for the "CELL" microprocessor are nearing completion. The CELL is a collaborative effort between IBM, Sony and Toshiba to design an unconventional next-generation, grid-enabled multimedia processor that has been referred to as a "supercomputer on a chip."

While exact details on CELL continue to elude the press, what is known is that CELL will power Sony's upcoming PlayStation 3 gaming console, be used in IBM's computers and throughout Toshiba's consumer electronic product lines.

Since it is grid-enabled, CELL is capable of utilizing high-bandwidth communications networks to distribute processing workloads between multiple devices. As a result of this capability, a single unit could conceptually achieve ultra-scale high performance computing (HPC) without the need for a supercomputer.

Wide-scale production of the CELL is scheduled to commence next year. A workable demo of the PlayStation is expected to be ready in time for next year's E3 trade show and Sony has claimed that CELL-powered graphics workstations could become available as soon as this Winter.