ViVA (Virtual Vector Architecture) is a technology from IBM for coupling together multiple

scalar Scalar may refer to: *Scalar (mathematics), an element of a field, which is used to define a vector space, usually the field of real numbers * Scalar (physics), a physical quantity that can be described by a single element of a number field such ...

floating point unit Floating may refer to: * a type of dental work performed on horse teeth * use of an isolation tank * the guitar-playing technique where chords are sustained rather than scratched * ''Floating'' (play), by Hugh Hughes * Floating (psychological phe ...

s to act as a single

vector processor In computing, a vector processor or array processor is a central processing unit (CPU) that implements an instruction set where its instructions are designed to operate efficiently and effectively on large one-dimensional arrays of data called ...

. Certain computing tasks are more efficiently handled through vector computations where an instruction can be applied to multiple elements simultaneously, rather than the scalar approach where one instruction is applied to one piece of data at a time. This kind of technology is highly sought after for scientific computing and is IBM's answer to the vector-based

supercomputer A supercomputer is a computer with a high level of performance as compared to a general-purpose computer. The performance of a supercomputer is commonly measured in floating-point operations per second ( FLOPS) instead of million instructions ...

s pioneered by

Cray Cray Inc., a subsidiary of Hewlett Packard Enterprise, is an American supercomputer manufacturer headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It also manufactures systems for data storage and analytics. Several Cray supercomputer systems are listed ...

and that was the basis for

NEC is a Japanese multinational information technology and electronics corporation, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo. The company was known as the Nippon Electric Company, Limited, before rebranding in 1983 as NEC. It provides IT and network soluti ...

Earth Simulator The is a series of supercomputers deployed at Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology Yokohama Institute of Earth Sciences. Earth Simulator (first generation) The first generation of Earth Simulator, developed by the Japanese go ...

which was the fastest supercomputer in the world 2002-2004. ViVA was developed and implemented by IBM together with

National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center The National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC), is a high-performance computing (supercomputer) National User Facility operated by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory for the United States Department of Energy Office of Scien ...

inside the Blue Planet project where they had 8 dual core POWER5 processors made into one vector processor capable of approximately 60-80

GFLOPS In computing, floating point operations per second (FLOPS, flops or flop/s) is a measure of computer performance, useful in fields of scientific computations that require floating-point calculations. For such cases, it is a more accurate meas ...

of computing power. ViVA technology is in use in the

ASC Purple ASC Purple was a supercomputer installed at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California. The computer was a collaboration between IBM Corporation and Lawrence Livermore Lab. Announced November 19, 2002, it was installed in ...

supercomputer. Where ViVA was a software implementation in high-end POWER5 based systems, the second generation, ViVA-2, is directly supported by hardware in the

POWER6 The POWER6 is a microprocessor developed by IBM that implemented the Power ISA v.2.03. When it became available in systems in 2007, it succeeded the POWER5+ as IBM's flagship Power microprocessor. It is claimed to be part of the eCLipz projec ...

processor.

References

*{{webarchive , date=2013-01-19 , url=https://archive.today/20130119131859/http://news.com.com/IBM+supercomputing+goes+retro/2100-1010_3-5425551.html , title=IBM supercomputing goes retro – CNet
Blue Planet: Extending IBM Power Technology and Virtual Vector Processing – NERSCScience-Driven System Architecture: A New Process for Leadership Class Computing – NERSCAn eCLipz Looms on the Horizon – Real World Technologies
IBM computer hardware