Rent A Cluster

hpc
Paul Nathan picture Paul Nathan · Apr 21, 2009 · Viewed 10.7k times · Source

I am wondering if there are clusters available to rent.

Scenario:

We have a program that will take what we estimate a week to run(after optimization) on a given file. Quite possibly, longer. Unfortunately, we also need to do approximately 300+ different files, resulting in approximately 300 weeks of compute time(roundable to 6 wallclock years of continuously running job). For a research job that should be done - at the latest - by December, that's simply unacceptable. While we are exploring other options, I am investigating the option of simply renting a Beowulf cluster. The job is academic and will lead towards the completion of a PhD.

What would be ideal would be a company that we send the source and the job files to the company and then receive a week or two later the result files. Voila!

Quick googling doesn't turn up anything terribly promising.

Suggested Solutions?

Answer

RossFabricant picture RossFabricant · Apr 21, 2009

Cloud computing sounds like what you need. Amazon, Microsoft and Google rent computer resources on a pay for what you use basis.

Amazon's service is the most mature, and there are several questions already about Amazon's service, EG here and here.