High Speed Beowulf Cluster using gigabit ethernet

[W Bauske]

Ole W Saastad wrote:
> 
> Ad. GBE interconnect.
> 
> Have you tested your applications with gigabit ethernet ?
> 
> The latency with GBE and fast ethernet are almost the same,
> and while you get much higher bandwidth (not 100 MB/sec, unfortunately)
> but substantially more than with 100 fast ethernet, the latency
> is still a showstopper for many applications.
> 
> GBE is still relatively expensive and you might be better of spending
> your extra money on  more nodes or a high performance interconnect.

Well, I just bought GbE cards for $36 each, and a couple 4 port GbE switches
for $130 each. Per port cost is $69. Get creative on how to connect things
to get the bandwidth you want. As long as you stay below 20 nodes or so
it shouldn't be too bad. Latency is still an issue though. 8 port GbE
switches go for $600 or so at the moment so less cost effective but less
switches needed if that will help the layout/performance.


Wes