Supercomputers/Systems/ECMWF VPP700/116
United Kingdom · operational · hpc
ECMWF VPP700/116
Also known as Fujitsu VPP700 at ECMWF
Operated by ECMWF at ECMWF Data Centre (Reading) .
Phase 1 seed dataset, compiled by hand. These rows were built from public operator, laboratory and vendor sources. A mechanical second-reader pass has since fetched every cited source: 1092 of 1153 systems have a readable citation that names them, and 40 are genuinely weakly sourced. Every claim carries its source and a confidence tier. Treat anything below verified as a lead, not a citation.
Measured performance
- Rmax
- 213.0 GFlop/s
- Rpeak
- 255.2 GFlop/s
- Rmax ÷ Rpeak
- 83.5%
- Cores
- 116
- Power
- -
- Per watt
- - GF/W
Figures are as last publicly reported for the configuration described below, not a live measurement. Where a system was upgraded in place, the post-upgrade configuration is shown and the earlier one appears in the timeline.
What this machine is made of
One row per supplier relationship. “Supplier at build” is the company that shipped the part at the time; where that company has since been acquired, the parent it rolls up to today is shown beside it. That distinction is what makes ticker-level aggregation possible across a thirty-year dataset.
| Role | Part | Supplier at build | Quantity | Confidence | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Integrator | - Fujitsu built the VPP700 vector-parallel system | Fujitsu | - | Reported | ecmwf.inttop500.org |
| Interconnect | - Fujitsu non-blocking crossbar switch between vector processing elements | Fujitsu | - | Reported | ecmwf.inttop500.org |
| Operating system | Fujitsu UXP Operating systems Unix (SVR4-derived), Fujitsu-customised · Proprietary Fujitsu UXP/V operating system | Fujitsu | - | Reported | top500.org |
The read
ECMWF's Fujitsu VPP700, the first operational distributed-memory vector-parallel forecasting machine at the centre. A 46-processor system began producing operational forecasts on 18 September 1996 (39 computing elements, six for I/O, one for batch and interactive work, each with 2 GB and joined by a non-blocking crossbar), and ECMWF's 2000 systems diagram shows it as a VPP700/116 beside a VPP700E/48 and the VPP5000/100. TOP500 lists the 46-PE machine at rank 10 in November 1996 (https://www.top500.org/system/172390/) and the 116-PE machine from November 1997 (rank 8, 213 GFlop/s Rmax, 255.2 GFlop/s Rpeak under UXP/V), last at rank 347 in November 2002 (https://www.top500.org/system/172362/). ECMWF says its Fujitsu era ended in 2002-2003 when IBM Cluster 1600 systems took over (first operational forecasts 4 March 2003); the shutdown date is not given, so status is recorded as of the last list appearance. TOP500 is the only source for Rmax, so the tier is reported.
Timeline
Public list appearances
Pointers only: rank and edition, linking to the canonical entry. We do not reproduce list tables. See sourcing policy.
Site & facility
Change history
- 2026-10-09 Added ECMWF VPP700/116
Source check
We fetched this system's own citations and recorded whether each page actually mentions it. This is a corroboration signal, not a fact check, and it is published so you can see how well the sourcing holds up rather than take it on trust.
| Cited source | Result | Found on the page |
|---|---|---|
| ecmwf.int | names system only | - |
| top500.org | names system only | - |
Checked 2026-10-09 by pnpm verify. Re-run it and the table changes with the web.
Further reading
Operating a supercomputer
Acceptance testing, why "installed" and "in production" are six months apart, and the machine lifecycle.
The interconnect
Topologies, why latency and tail behaviour matter more than bandwidth, and how the fabric market consolidated.
Programming a supercomputer
The software stack beneath the application, and why the OS is now a sovereignty signal as much as a technical choice.