The upgraded Cray systems will allow DWD to continue to improve its highly-complex models for providing more accurate weather forecasts for a wide array of weather responsibilities. With the significant increase in compute performance and storage capacity, the researchers and scientists at DWD will be able to apply more advanced supercomputing technologies towards its mission of meeting the meteorological requirements arising from all areas of economy and society in Germany. “Supercomputers are absolutely vital to our mission of providing important meteorological services for the protection of life and property,” said. Dr. Jochen Dibbern, Member of the Executive Board at DWD. “Our Cray supercomputers are critical tools for our researchers and scientists, and it’s imperative that we equip our users with highly advanced supercomputing technologies.”
“We are honored that DWD has once again turned to Cray to deliver the additional compute power and storage capacity necessary for running more complex numerical weather predictions,” said Dominik Ulmer, Cray’s vice president of operations for the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region. “As the clear leader in building supercomputers for the world’s top numerical weather prediction centers, we take great pride in knowing that important weather forecasts across the globe are run on Cray supercomputers. We are proud of our partnership with DWD and we are pleased it will continue.”
In January 2013, Cray announced it was awarded a contract to provide DWD with two Cray® XC30™ supercomputers and two Cray Sonexion storage systems. Under the terms of this new contract, Cray will upgrade and expand the supercomputers at DWD to Cray® XC40™ systems, which will include the new Intel® Xeon® processor E5-2600 v4 product family. As part of this upgrade, DWD will also receive additional Cray Sonexion 2000 scale-out Lustre storage capacity, and a future 12-node Cray® CS400™ system with the next-generation of the Intel® Xeon Phi™ processor.
The Cray XC series of supercomputers, along with the Cray® CS™ line of cluster supercomputers and the Cray® CS-Storm™ systems, are now available with the new Intel Xeon E5-2600 v4 product family. The new processors enable peak performance boosts of up to 30 percent for new and existing Cray XC and Cray CS systems over previous generations.
DWD joins a growing list of Cray customers that will add the new Intel Xeon processors to their Cray XC supercomputers. These customers include the Swiss National Supercomputing Centre (CSCS) in Lugano, Switzerland, the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), and the Met Office, both of which are located in the United Kingdom. Additionally, the Cray CS400 cluster supercomputer at the Alfred Wegener Institute in Bremerhaven, Germany will also include the new Intel Xeon processors.
“DWD’s selection of Cray’s new family of supercomputers, powered by the new Intel Xeon processor E5-2600 v4 product family, will enable significant improvement in their weather prediction models,” said Hugo Saleh, director of marketing, High Performance Computing Platform Group, Intel. “Combining Cray supercomputers with Intel’s new Xeon processor E5-2695 v4 and Intel® Xeon Phi™ processor, both elements of the Intel® Scalable System Framework, will enable DWD researchers and scientists to improve the resolution of regional and worldwide weather forecasts enabling for more accurate prediction and safeguarding against inclement weather.”
Consisting of product and multiple years of service, the contract to upgrade and expand the Cray systems at DWD is valued at about $11 million. Product deliveries are expected in 2016.
