'16 vector processors, each capable of 1 GFLOPS performance, main memory amounting to 512 MegaWords (4GB), and a 512MW (4GB) Solid-state Storage Device (SSD) serving as an extension to memory. He comes with raid controllers and disks providing over 130GB of high-speed disk storage.'
I am again reminded that our industry is insane. That machine is not even a top-line laptop anymore.
If you were to take that machine and put it up against a 1 GFLOP desktop with the equivalent amount of RAM and disk storage, the Cray would annihilate it on the tasks that it was purchased for.
That is true for almost every specialised hardware.
On the other hand, take a GPU fitted to the graphics card of your desktop. I suspect it will outperform Cray in this kind of task. Especially if one takes price into account.
Glen Miranker and Jon Rubenstein of Ardent made their way to Apple where they spec'd/designed the Velocity Engine that went into the PowerPC G4/5. It had a 128-bit vector execution unit that required the use of the AltiVec API.
Sigh. At least it's pretty to look at!