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Centre for Internet Technologies

The University of Sunderland Grid Computer

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Grid Networking

Photograph of network cabling

The Grid operates its own dedicated network. This network architecture was designed by Cisco and provides three gigabit network interfaces for each node. The network interfaces are:

  1. Intelligent Platform Management Interface (IPMI). This supports management of the nodes from the head node independent of the operating system in use at the time by means of the Baseboard Management Controller. This system allows the nodes to be turned on and off, and restarted, centrally from the head node.
  2. Inter-Process Communications (IPC). This network allows one node to communicate directly with the memory space of another, which is useful for data intensive applications where data is passed from one node to the next during the operation.
  3. Data. This network operates as a normal data network carrying all the traffic of the Grid other than that handled by IPC and IPMI.

The Grid has a dedicated Cisco 6509 router which handles all the networking for the nodes, the workstations, and the link to the campus network gateway.

One cabinet of the Grid system contains nodes which also include Infiniband networking capabilities, and an Infiniband switch. This high performance network can be used for specialist high throughput and ultra low latency applications.