Can Windows Dual-Boot Onto Linux Stage?
Windows may never boot Linux from its dominant role in computing, but Microsoft's dual-boot strategy is making some inroads.
A piece in Computerworld today indicates that IBM will soon build what may be the largest Windows/Linux HPC dual-boot system yet.
IBM today plans to detail a blade system running 5,376 Intel Xeon quad-core processors; each chip runs at 2.5 GHz and uses 50 watts.
According to some Ft. Lauderdale computer repair experts, the system will be running a beta version of Windows HPC Server 2008.
The system was built at Umea University in Stockholm, Sweden, so that a consortium of universities in that country could use these cutting-edge computing resources for a wide range of academic disciplines.
Right now, it is estimated that Linux is used on about 85 percent of all HPC systems, according to the Top 500 computing list in the United States and in Europe, with Windows having less than 2 percent.
The Umea University machine would rank in the top 50 of the list of most powerful systems - at least according to the old list.
For its part, Microsoft has been interested in HPC for about three years, but it hasn't seen a lot of growth in this area.
Although most HPC applications run on Linux, some researchers do their work on Windows-based workstations, and the dual-boot strategy may have a unique ability to the HPC for both kinds of operating system users.
