Do you worry that newfangled technologies are making the traditional giants of high-speed computing obsolete? One look at the newly updated list of the top 500 supercomputers should calm your nerves.
The long-rumored invasion of ARM chips in the data center is still not happening. Intel (INTC +4.36%) chips power eight of the top 10 systems this time, and 403 of the top 500. That dominant 80% share is up from 76% six months ago. Second-place contender Advanced Micro Devices (AMD +18.37%) lost the top spot to a brand-new Intel-powered supercomputer from China, lost 2% of its top 500 share, and only accounts for 10% of the top systems. And again, there's not an ARM system to be seen.
Score one big win for Dow (^DJI +1.24%) component Intel. The microchip titan always rules this list with an iron fist, but its steely grip just tightened a little bit harder.
And the parade of Dow-based winners continues. IBM (IBM 1.44%) is a minor player in the processor race with just an 8.2% share of the top 500 performers. But it's still the leading systems-builder, having assembled 32% of the big list and half of the top 10. Hewlett-Packard (HPQ +1.23%) pulled out a surprise win by leaping to a 38% share of the 500-system list, gaining 9% since the previous update and leapfrogging IBM. HP didn't land any design wins in the top 10.
This list provides plenty of reason to believe in a future for these traditional computing powerhouses. Even in the age of ubiquitous ARM chips and mobile computing, nothing beats a good old stack of high-powered Intel Xeon processors in an HP or IBM rack when it comes to tackling the really tough number-crunching problems.
The consumer-level IT world is changing fast, but the "big iron" isn't going away.
