San Diego Supercomputer Center Hosts Single-Board Cluster Competition

Published June 28, 2023

SDSC’s Supercomputing Club is led by Mary Thomas (front row, center).  Credit: San Diego Supercomputer Center

By Kimberly Mann Bruch

The Supercomputing Club of San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) at UC San Diego organized a local, independent student cluster competition called the Single Board Cluster Competition that took place last month. In the day-long competition, teams were challenged to create the most efficient cluster using single board computers—PCs inclusive of all components in one board—to perform complex tasks while remaining below the power and cost limits. Southern California teams from UC San Diego, Pasadena City College, Southwestern College and an international team from Denmark’s Aalborg University (AAU) participated.

“Participants ran several benchmarks to showcase the performance of their clusters,” said Mary Thomas, who mentors the SCC team and oversaw the competition. “We were very pleased with the turn-out, and it was great to see all the students cheer one another on.”

While the AAU team won the overall competition, Pasadena City College placed second, UC San Diego came in third and Southwestern College finished in fourth place.