# CRESCO8 - ThinkSystem

> Italian supercomputer 2025

**Wikidata**: [Q135067403](https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q135067403)  
**Source**: https://4ort.xyz/entity/cresco8-thinksystem

## Summary

CRESCO8 - ThinkSystem is an Italian supercomputer that entered service in 2025, ranking 228th on the June 2025 TOP500 list. Manufactured by Lenovo, the system delivers 5.43 petaflops of sustained performance and is operated by Italy's National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development for scientific research applications.

## Key Facts

- **TOP500 Ranking**: 228th position as of June 2025, with system ID 180386.
- **Manufacturer**: Lenovo Group Limited, a Chinese multinational technology company.
- **Operator**: Agenzia nazionale per le nuove tecnologie, l'energia e lo sviluppo economico sostenibile (Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development).
- **Country of Origin**: Italy.
- **Inception Year**: 2025.
- **System Model**: ThinkSystem SD650 V3.
- **Processor**: Intel Xeon Platinum 8592+ with 64 cores per processor, clocked at 1.9GHz.
- **Total Processor Cores**: 97,280 cores across the entire system.
- **Interconnect Technology**: Infiniband NDR (Next Data Rate).
- **Operating System**: Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) version 9.4.
- **Performance (Rmax)**: 5.43 petaflops (sustained performance).
- **Performance (Rpeak)**: 5.91 petaflops (theoretical peak performance).
- **Nmax Value**: 6,387,456 (problem size for achieving Rmax performance).
- **Primary Use Case**: Research applications.
- **Alternative Names**: Also referred to as CRESCO and ThinkSystem.

## FAQs

**What is CRESCO8 and where is it deployed?**  
CRESCO8 is a supercomputer installed in Italy in 2025, operated by the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development. It serves as a national resource for scientific research and computational science projects.

**Who manufactured the CRESCO8 supercomputer?**  
Lenovo, a Chinese technology company founded in 1984, built CRESCO8 using its ThinkSystem SD650 V3 platform, which employs direct water cooling for high-density computing.

**What processors power CRESCO8?**  
The system uses Intel Xeon Platinum 8592+ processors, each containing 64 cores running at 1.9GHz, totaling 97,280 cores across the entire installation.

**How does CRESCO8 rank among the world's supercomputers?**  
CRESCO8 holds the 228th position on the June 2025 TOP500 list, placing it in the top tier of global high-performance computing systems with a sustained performance of 5.43 petaflops.

**What networking technology connects the nodes in CRESCO8?**  
The system utilizes Infiniband NDR (Next Data Rate) interconnect, providing high-bandwidth, low-latency communication between compute nodes essential for parallel processing workloads.

**What operating system does CRESCO8 run?**  
CRESCO8 operates on Red Hat Enterprise Linux version 9.4, a Linux distribution optimized for enterprise and high-performance computing environments.

**What is the performance difference between Rmax and Rpeak for CRESCO8?**  
Rmax measures the actual sustained performance of 5.43 petaflops on the LINPACK benchmark, while Rpeak represents the theoretical maximum of 5.91 petaflops if all processors operated at peak efficiency continuously.

## Why It Matters

CRESCO8 represents Italy's continued investment in national high-performance computing infrastructure, providing researchers with a 5.43-petaflop resource capable of tackling complex simulations in physics, chemistry, climate modeling, and materials science. As a 2025 deployment, it demonstrates the ongoing evolution of supercomputing technology, where systems achieve multi-petaflop performance using advanced processor architectures and direct liquid cooling. The system's ranking at 228 on the TOP500 list places it among the most powerful computers globally, giving Italian scientists and engineers a competitive platform for international research collaborations. Lenovo's role as manufacturer highlights the company's expansion from consumer electronics into the high-performance computing market, where its ThinkSystem SD650 V3 architecture competes with traditional HPC vendors. For the research community, CRESCO8's Infiniband NDR network and 97,280-core count enable large-scale parallel applications that would be impossible on smaller systems, accelerating scientific discovery and technological innovation within Italy's national research agenda.

## Notable For

- **2025 Deployment**: One of the newest supercomputers on the 2025 TOP500 list, representing current-generation HPC technology.
- **Italian National Resource**: Operated by a government agency specifically dedicated to sustainable technology development and economic growth.
- **Lenovo HPC Architecture**: Built on the ThinkSystem SD650 V3 platform, showcasing Lenovo's direct water-cooled, high-density server design for extreme computational workloads.
- **Multi-Petaflop Performance**: Achieves over 5 petaflops of sustained performance, placing it in the upper tier of global supercomputers.
- **Large-Scale Core Count**: Features 97,280 processor cores, enabling massive parallelism for scientific applications.
- **Modern Interconnect**: Utilizes Infiniband NDR, the latest generation of high-performance networking for HPC clusters.
- **Enterprise Linux Foundation**: Runs RHEL 9.4, demonstrating the use of commercially supported Linux in mission-critical research environments.

## Body

### System Overview and Identification

CRESCO8 - ThinkSystem is identified in the TOP500 database under system ID 180386, with the full designation "CRESCO8 - ThinkSystem SD650 V3, Xeon Platinum 8592+ 64C 1.9GHz, Infiniband NDR, RHEL 9.4." The system carries multiple aliases including CRESCO, CRESCO8, and ThinkSystem, reflecting its integration into Italy's broader CRESCO (Computing Resources for Science and COmputation) infrastructure. As an instance of a supercomputer, it was launched in 2025 and immediately earned placement on the TOP500 ranking, the authoritative list of the world's most powerful computer systems.

### Technical Architecture

The computational foundation of CRESCO8 consists of Lenovo's ThinkSystem SD650 V3 servers, a platform designed for high-density, water-cooled operation in data centers. Each server node houses Intel Xeon Platinum 8592+ processors, which feature 64 cores operating at a base frequency of 1.9GHz. The aggregate system comprises 97,280 cores distributed across multiple nodes, providing the raw computational capacity necessary for scientific simulations. Inter-node communication relies on Infiniband NDR technology, the successor to HDR, offering enhanced bandwidth and reduced latency for parallel message passing interface (MPI) applications. The system runs Red Hat Enterprise Linux version 9.4, providing a stable, security-focused operating environment with long-term support essential for production research workloads.

### Performance Metrics and Benchmarking

CRESCO8's performance credentials are validated through standardized LINPACK benchmarking, which measures floating-point computation speed. The system achieved an Rmax score of 5.43 petaflops, representing the maximum performance sustained during the benchmark test with a problem size (Nmax) of 6,387,456. The theoretical peak performance (Rpeak) reaches 5.91 petaflops, calculated by multiplying the total core count by the clock speed and floating-point operations per cycle. This performance-to-peak ratio of approximately 92% indicates efficient system design and effective utilization of the underlying hardware. The 5.43 petaflop capacity enables CRESCO8 to perform quintillions of calculations per second, supporting applications such as molecular dynamics, computational fluid dynamics, and genomic sequencing.

### Operational Context and Governance

The supercomputer is operated by the Agenzia nazionale per le nuove tecnologie, l'energia e lo sviluppo economico sostenibile (ENEA), Italy's national agency tasked with promoting innovation in energy, environmental technologies, and sustainable development. ENEA's operation of CRESCO8 aligns with its mission to provide advanced computational resources for public research institutions, universities, and industry partners. The system's classification within the research industry indicates its primary function as a scientific instrument rather than a commercial or cloud computing platform. As a national asset, CRESCO8 supports projects funded by Italian and European research programs, contributing to advancements in renewable energy, nuclear fusion, climate modeling, and materials science.

### Manufacturer Profile and HPC Market Position

Lenovo, founded in 1984 by Liu Chuanzhi and headquartered in Beijing, China, manufactures CRESCO8. With 77,000 employees as of 2023, Lenovo has evolved from a PC manufacturer into a significant player in the data center and high-performance computing markets. The company's ThinkSystem SD650 V3 architecture represents its third-generation direct water-cooled server design, which reduces data center power consumption and enables higher processor densities than air-cooled alternatives. Lenovo's supercomputing portfolio includes other notable systems such as the ZZ5 in China and the Oleg system in Russia, demonstrating its global HPC footprint. The company's membership in technology alliances including the Linux Foundation, Wi-Fi Alliance, and FIDO Alliance reflects its commitment to open standards and interoperability in computing ecosystems.

### TOP500 Recognition and Global Standing

CRESCO8's debut at rank 228 on the June 2025 TOP500 list positions it within the top 250 supercomputers worldwide, a competitive placement given that the list includes over 500 systems across more than 30 countries. This ranking reflects both the system's raw performance and the efficiency of its architecture as measured by the LINPACK benchmark. The TOP500 entry, published on June 25, 2025, provides authoritative verification of CRESCO8's specifications and performance claims, serving as the primary reference for its technical details. Achieving this rank in 2025 indicates the system incorporates contemporary processor and interconnect technologies, making it relevant for the current generation of computational science challenges.

## References

1. [Source](https://www.top500.org/site/47796/)
2. TOP500