Cray Offers Air-Cooled Version of its XC30 Supercomputer

Cray announced a new addition to its XC30 systems, with the XC30-AC (air-cooled) supercomputer. The new model includes all of the advanced high performance computing (HPC) technologies offered in the Cray XC30 system, and features aggressive price points intended to attract a new a class of HPC users - the technical enterprise.

The air cooled model economizes the packaging, networking, cooling and power options of the Cray XC30, while balancing customer price/performance requirements.  Prices for the XC30-AC start at $500,000. The XC30-AC enables technical enterprise HPC users in a variety of industries to apply supercomputing resources towards solving technical and business challenges. Additionally Cray has a line of cluster supercomputer offerings, the CS300 cluster supercomputers, to compliment the XC30-AC systems.

"Innovation is not limited to Fortune 100 companies. There are many Fortune 1000 companies, and even departments within Fortune 100 companies, with a growing need for a supercomputing system that provides a critical tool for taking advantage of performing complex simulations," said Peg Williams, Cray's senior vice president of high performance computing systems.

Cray states that the new model has all of the features and functionality of its high-end Cray XC30 systems, and is suited for technical enterprise customers, helping them access supercomputing capacity at a lower price.

The XC30-AC has allowed Cray to enter new markets for its supercomputers, with early customers including a global consumer electronics company and a global financial services company. It is targeted at less-traditional HPC segments, as well as a broader class of users in more traditional HPC markets, such as academia, defense and earth sciences. While the XC30-AC contains many of the features of the XC30, it differs in that it is air cooled, has physically smaller compute cabinets with 16 vertical blades per cabinet, has a single fan for bottom-to-top vertical air flow, and has a lower power option supporting either 480V or 208V operation.

"Cray has a history of leveraging the supercomputing technologies featured in their high-end systems, and economically repackaging those same technologies to offer solutions to fit the needs of HPC users with smaller budgets," said Earl Joseph, IDC program vice president for HPC. "Simulation is no longer bound by the high-end data center, and Cray's new XC30-AC system continues the company's tradition of creating purpose-built systems that appeal to new customers in expanding segments of the supercomputing market."