Supercomputers/Systems/Fermi
Italy · decommissioned · hpc
Fermi
Also known as FERMI Blue Gene/Q at CINECA
Operated by CINECA .
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
- 1.79 PFlop/s
- Rpeak
- 2.10 PFlop/s
- Rmax ÷ Rpeak
- 85.3%
- Cores
- 163,840
- Power
- 822 kW
- Per watt
- 2.2 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 | - IBM BlueGene/Q | IBM | - | Reported | top500.orghpc.cineca.it |
| CPU | IBM PowerPC A2 (Power BQC) CPUs PowerPC A2 · 18C · 1.6 GHz · 45 nm · 55 W Power BQC 16C 1.60GHz | IBM | - | Reported | top500.orghpc.cineca.it |
| Interconnect | IBM BlueGene/Q 5D torus Interconnect 5D torus · 2 GB/s per link per direction Custom Blue Gene/Q interconnect | IBM | - | Reported | top500.org |
The read
CINECA's IBM Blue Gene/Q, Italy's national tier-0 system and a PRACE resource, with 10,240 PowerA2 processors of 16 cores each (163,840 cores), seventh on the June 2012 TOP500. CINECA's news item confirms the hardware and the June 2012 install; Wikipedia gives full production from 8 August 2012. CINECA's Marconi page says Marconi replaced FERMI in June 2016, which is why the year 2016 is recorded as the end date. The system stayed on the TOP500 through June 2017. TOP500 is the only source for Rmax, Rpeak and power, so the tier is reported. Site left blank because the fetched sources place it at CINECA's Casalecchio di Reno campus rather than at a site already in this dataset.
Timeline
- 2012-06 List debut at #7 (June 2012) source
- 2012-08 First operational source
- 2016 Decommissioned source
Public list appearances
Pointers only: rank and edition, linking to the canonical entry. We do not reproduce list tables. See sourcing policy.
Change history
- 2026-10-02 Added Fermi, the CINECA Blue Gene/Q, seventh on the June 2012 TOP500
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 |
|---|---|---|
| hpc.cineca.it | names system only | - |
| top500.org | names system and part | IBM BlueGene/Q 5D torus |
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.
Inside a node
Latency-optimised versus throughput-optimised processors, NUMA, and the end of the host-to-device copy.
The interconnect
Topologies, why latency and tail behaviour matter more than bandwidth, and how the fabric market consolidated.