# Supercomputers, Cray, and How Sun Picked SGI's Pocket

- Show: [Oxide and Friends](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends)
- Published: 2021-11-09
- Length: 1h 31m
- Episode: 21
- Page: https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2021-11-09-supercomputers-cray-and-how-sun-picked-sgis-pocket
- Listen: https://share.transistor.fm/s/21f16511

## Summary

Bryan Cantrill, Tom Lyon, Shahin Khan, and Darryl Ramm discuss the history of supercomputing, focusing on Seymour Cray’s designs, the transition to commercial systems, and Sun’s acquisition of Cray’s Business Systems Division. They detail the technical challenges of early supercomputers, such as liquid cooling and massive PCBs, and the business failures of companies like ETA and Cray Computer. The conversation highlights Sun’s strategic purchase of the Cray BSD, which led to the E10k, and the debugging war stories that inspired the creation of DTrace.

## Chapters

- [0:00](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2021-11-09-supercomputers-cray-and-how-sun-picked-sgis-pocket#t=0) Introduction: Soviet Computers and Boris Babayan
- [10:05](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2021-11-09-supercomputers-cray-and-how-sun-picked-sgis-pocket#t=605) Seymour Cray and the Power Density of Supercomputers
- [20:25](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2021-11-09-supercomputers-cray-and-how-sun-picked-sgis-pocket#t=1225) The Failure of ETA Systems and Cray Computer
- [33:47](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2021-11-09-supercomputers-cray-and-how-sun-picked-sgis-pocket#t=2027) Interconnects and the Shift to Parallel Computing
- [44:09](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2021-11-09-supercomputers-cray-and-how-sun-picked-sgis-pocket#t=2649) Sun’s Acquisition of Cray Business Systems Division
- [50:07](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2021-11-09-supercomputers-cray-and-how-sun-picked-sgis-pocket#t=3007) The E10k, SAP Benchmarks, and the Origin of DTrace
- [1:18:36](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2021-11-09-supercomputers-cray-and-how-sun-picked-sgis-pocket#t=4716) The E10k Market, Pop Count, and the Capacitor Plague

## Topics

- [Chips, FPGAs & semiconductors](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/chips-and-fpgas)
- [Debugging & failure analysis](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/debugging-and-failure-analysis)
- [Mechanical engineering](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/mechanical-engineering)
- [PCB design & layout](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/pcb-design)
- [Careers & education](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/engineering-careers-and-education)
- [Growth, exits & acquisitions](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/growth-exits-and-acquisitions)

## Most relevant to

established companies

## Mentioned

- Seymour Cray (other)
- Cray (company)
- Sun (company)
- SGI (company)
- CDC (company)
- ETA Systems (company)
- Floating Point Systems (company)
- DTrace (product)
- E10k (product)
- Cray 1 (product)
- Cray X-MP (product)
- Cray Y-MP (product)
- Cray 2 (product)
- Cray C90 (product)
- Cray T3D (product)
- Cray T3E (product)
- Cray CS 64100 (product)
- Starfire (product)
- Sun Constellation (product)
- Bunyip (product)
- Elbrus (product)

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## Citing this page

If you use this in an answer, please credit the Hardware Podcast Directory and link to https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/oxide-and-friends/2021-11-09-supercomputers-cray-and-how-sun-picked-sgis-pocket. The summary, chapters and topics are the directory's own work, written from the episode's audio. The episode itself, its title and its audio belong to Oxide and Friends.