Illiac IV

Illiac IV

   <computer> One of the most infamous {supercomputers} ever.  It
   used early ideas on {SIMD} (single instruction stream,
   multiple data streams).  The project started in 1965, it used
   64 processors and a 13MHz clock.  In 1976 it ran its first
   sucessfull application.  It had 1MB memory (64x16KB).

   Its actual performance was 15 MFLOPS, it was estimated in
   initial predictions to be 1000 MFLOPS.  It totally failed as a
   computer, only a quarter of the fully planned machine was ever
   built, costs escalated from the $8 million estimated in 1966
   to $31 million by 1972, and the computer took three more years
   of enginering before it was operational.

   The only good it did was to push research forward a bit,
   leading way for machines such as the {Thinking Machines}
   {CM-1} and CM-2.

   (1995-04-28)