The TOP500 Project: Looking Back over 15 Years of Supercomputing Experience

Hans Meuer looks back over 15 years of supercomputing experience starting with the Mannheim supercomputing statistics in 1986 and then moving forward with the TOP500 project, launched in 1993. Twice a year, a list of the sites operating the world’s 500 most powerful computer systems is compiled and released.

The best performance on the Linpack benchmark is used as the measurement for ranking the computer systems. The list contains a variety of information including the systems’ specifications and major application areas.

The complete article can be downloaded here in PDF format