All AMD-Powered Frontier Supercomputer Creates History, World’s First True Exascale Machine With 1.1 Exaflops of Horsepower Thanks To EPYC CPUs & Instinct GPUs

The all AMD-Powered Frontier supercomputer has created history, becoming the world's first system to be a true exascale machine thanks to EPYC CPUs & Instinct GPUs.

ORNL's Frontier supercomputer has been designed from the ground up with AMD's 3rd Gen EPYC Trento CPUs and Instinct MI250X GPU accelerators. We already got to see a preview of the system through the 'Crusher' system earlier this year but now, with Frontier fully activated, we can talk of the real thing.

Frontier is the new No. 1 system in the TOP500. This HPE Cray EX system is the first US system with a peak performance exceeding one ExaFlop/s. It is currently being integrated and tested at the ORNL in Tennessee, USA, where it will be operated by the Department of Energy (DOE). It currently has achieved 1.102 Exaflop/s using 8,730,112 cores. The new HPE Cray EX architecture combines 3rd Gen AMD EPYC CPUs optimized for HPC and AI with AMD Instinct 250X accelerators and Slingshot-11 interconnect. via TOP500

In addition, the Frontier test and development system (TDS) secured the top spot on the Green500 list, delivering 62.68 gigaflops/watt power-efficiency from a single cabinet of optimized 3rd Gen AMD EPYC processors and AMD Instinct MI250x accelerators. Finally, Frontier’s mixed-precision computing performance clocked in at 6.86 exaflops, as measured by the High-Performance Linpack-Accelerator Introspection, or HPL-AI, test. Next steps for Frontier include continued testing and validation of the system, which remains on track for final acceptance and early science access later in 2022, and open for full science at the beginning of 2023.

Frontier isn't just marking history being the first Exaflop supercomputer but it also exceeds its own goals, surpassing the 1 Exaflop barrier by 10% (1.102 Exaflops). As such, the system has achieved the number one spot on the Top500 & Green500 list.

Press Release: The 59th edition of the TOP500 revealed the Frontier system to be the first true exascale machine with an HPL score of 1.102 Exaflop/s.

The No. 1 spot is now held by the Frontier system at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in the US. Based on the latest HPE Cray EX235a architecture and equipped with AMD EPYC 64C 2GHz processors, the system has 8,730,112 total cores, a power efficiency rating of 52.23 gigaflops/watt, and relies on gigabit ethernet for data transfer.

However, a recent development to the Frontier system has allowed the machine to surpass the 1 exaflop barrier. With an exact HPL score of 1.102 Exaflop/s, Frontier is not only the most powerful supercomputer to ever exist – but it’s also the first true exascale machine.

The top position was previously held for two years straight by the Fugaku system at the RIKEN Center for Computational Science (R-CCS) in Kobe, Japan. Sticking with its previous HPL benchmark score of 442 PFlop/s, Fugaku has now dropped to No. 2. Considering the fact that Fugaku’s theoretical peak is above the 1 exaflop barrier, there’s cause to also call this system an exascale machine as well. However, Frontier is the only system able to demonstrate this on the HPL benchmark test.

Another change within the TOP10 is the introduction of the LUMI system at EUROHPC/CSC in Finland. Now occupying the No. 3 spot, this new system has 1,110,144 cores and has an HPL benchmark of nearly 152 PFlop/s. LUMI is also noteworthy in that it is the largest system in Europe.

Top500 List (Updated June 2022):