Seismic boost for IBM Linux clusters

Any fears that Linux will not scale should be dispelled by IBM's announcement today of an upgrade order for 1,280 dual-processor Linux clusters from seismic processing company WesternGeco.

WesternGeco now has more than 2,500 IBM eServer xSeries 330 processors installed in its London data centre, the biggest Linux deployment in Europe.

The company ordered 256 IBM eServer xSeries 330 systems about a year ago, all running Linux to form a 256-node supercomputer. A further 642 dual-processor nodes were purchased in March.

The same models have again been selected, each with 1.4Ghz Intel Pentium III processors, due to come on stream next month. They will also run Windows NT.

"We have about 500 algorithms for seismic data and new ones come into fashion from time to time," said John Close, data processing manager for WesternGeco in Europe and Africa.

"The Kirchhoff Pre-stack Time Migration algorithm is now in fashion but uses enormous computer power, so it was uneconomic to run it before."

Results of these complex calculations help oil companies find potential drill sites.

WesternGeco previously had a range of systems, especially IBM SB2 mainframes running AIX, IBM's Unix flavour. So moving to Linux did not involve a big learning curve. Price/performance ratios drove the move, said Close.

Dave Jursik, Big Blue's vice president for emerging Linux technologies, told vnunet.com: "IBM's cluster strategy is built on xSeries Intel-based servers and will help the world realise the promise of Linux.

"It will become more pervasive as it is strengthened with such things as self-healing and optimising."

He explained that IBM's Linux thrust was such that all its core software - DB2, WebSphere, Tivoli and Lotus middleware - was already enabled on Linux. Its billion-dollar investment in Linux last year had been more than recouped, he said.

A single IBM Linux cluster is currently scalable from four to 1,024 nodes (2,048 processors). It can be managed from a single point either as a single machine or as a multi-node system.

Close said that about four rack-mounted clusters, two with 1,000 processors and two with 1,200 processors, were being used at the data centre, which was now full.

Further, smaller Linux clusters would be deployed at centres in other countries, while use of Windows NT, currently deployed for some master nodes, would be phased out.

WesternGeco is a joint venture between Schlumberger and Baker Hughes.