Title: A Case Study in the Application of a Tightly Coupled Multiprocessor to Scientific Computations
Abstract: Computational physicists, chemists, and biologists need hardware and software facilities that are capable of solving numerical problems. Processors that are capable of executing several operations are a cost-effective way of supplying these needs than are serial computers. This chapter presents the experiments designed to understand the potential of a general-purpose tightly coupled multiprocessor. It describes the hardware and software characteristics of multiprocessors. From the hardware engineering point of view, multiprocessors may offer attractive solutions to the problem of increasing the performance of computers than the parallel machines, because they are able to take advantage of simple regular designs, which employ replicated standard components. When suitable communication structures are used, they allow extensibility and reliability. To a certain extent, the regularity of the design is achieved at the expense of removing specialized and centralized control, and one of the characteristics of software that executes on multiple instruction, multiple data (MIMD) machines is the need to provide control using a variety of programming techniques. This involves software overheads, in terms of design complexity and execution costs.
Publication Year: 1982
Publication Date: 1982-01-01
Language: en
Type: book-chapter
Indexed In: ['crossref']
Access and Citation
Cited By Count: 7
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