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Old Jun 22, 2012, 10:51 am
  #9  
BonzoESC
 
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: Miami
Programs: DL Silver, AA Gold
Posts: 568
Originally Posted by planemechanic
I would imagine either the CIA/NSA or the US DOD has better super computers that they just don't talk about.
Doubtful; they have the budget to build a computer optimized for any given task, and wouldn't need a big general-purpose supercomputer. If they do, the DoE can sell them time.

For cracking encryption, getting an Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) designed and built pays off if you're going to be buying them in volume. For other military tasks, there's going to be a requirement that they distribute them, and at that point you have to decide if it all has to be in the same building to count as a supercomputer or not. Facebook and Google certainly have more processing power, but they don't call the network spanning their datacenters a "supercomputer" for some reason.
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