DocumentCode :
2299462
Title :
The START-VOYAGER parallel system
Author :
Ang, Boon S. ; Chiou, Derek ; Rudolph, Larry ; Arvind
Author_Institution :
Lab. for Comput. Sci., MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA
fYear :
1998
fDate :
12-18 Oct 1998
Firstpage :
185
Lastpage :
194
Abstract :
This paper presents the communication architecture of the START-VOYAGER system, a parallel machine composed of a cluster of unmodified IBM 604e-based SMP´s connected via a high speed interconnection network. A custom network interface unit (NIU) plugs into a processor card slot of each SMP, providing a high-performance message passing substrate that supports both fast user-level message passing and cache-line coherent shared memory. The substrate consists of four hardware implemented message passing mechanisms to achieve high performance over a wide spectrum of communication patterns. START-VOYAGER also introduces a novel protection scheme which improves upon past designs by not requiring strictly synchronized gang-scheduling and by allowing system code and multiple user applications to share the network simultaneously without compromising protection nor performance. Performance predictions based on synthesized Verilog code show START-VOYAGER´s novel message passing mechanisms offer a definitive advantage in a multi-threaded environment without compromising the performance in a single-threaded environment. Preliminary shared memory simulations are also promising
Keywords :
message passing; parallel architectures; performance evaluation; START-VOYAGER system; custom network interface unit; gang-scheduling; multi-threaded environment; parallel machine; performance predictions; shared memory; user-level message passing; Computational modeling; Computer science; Concurrent computing; Laboratories; Message passing; Parallel machines; Plugs; Processor scheduling; Protection; Workstations;
fLanguage :
English
Publisher :
ieee
Conference_Titel :
Parallel Architectures and Compilation Techniques, 1998. Proceedings. 1998 International Conference on
Conference_Location :
Paris
ISSN :
1089-795X
Print_ISBN :
0-8186-8591-3
Type :
conf
DOI :
10.1109/PACT.1998.727191
Filename :
727191
Link To Document :
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