The TOP25 list of supercomputer sites is given in Table 14.1. This list has been established by simply adding the LINPACK [tex2html_wrap2108] performancein Gflop/s of all supercomputers installed at a given site. Generally under a `site' we have combined supercomputers, which are installed in the same geographical location, and belong to the same organizational unit. The column `machines' lists the machines whose performance have been added to reach the total performance for a site. The integers refer to the ranking of these supercomputers on the TOP500. The performance column lists the aggregate performance of all the machines at the site in LINPACK [tex2html_wrap2110]-Gflop/s. An excellent and current overview of the supercomputers in use is [5].
There are several intriguing observations one can make from Table 14.1. In order to qualify as a top supercomputer site, and installation must have at least a full 16 processor Cray C90. Any site with a smaller machine does not not make the list. The typical installation on the list has now one large supercomputer, and a number of smaller machines. The vendors have different configurations consisting of a larger number of small machines.
The list also shows how much U.S. government spending dominates the supercomputing world. All 18 U.S. non-vendor sites directly or indirectly are funded by the U.S. government. There are 13 U.S. government laboratories, and the five U.S. universities receive their support for supercomputers from the NSF, DoD (Minnesota), or a consortium of government agencies (Caltech). However, also the foreign sites are also all falling into the same category, and are government institutions in their countries.
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