Sorry guys, its not the cell. Source - http://www.tomshardware.com/news/PC-supercomputer,5513.html

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The desktop PC, called Fastra, was built with a focus on the development of new computational methods for tomography. Tomography is a technique used in medical scanners to create three-dimensional images of the internal organs of patients, based on a large number of x-ray photos that are acquired over a range of angles. As these 3D images can be quite large, advanced reconstruction techniques can sometimes require weeks of computation time on a regular PC. Which means that supercomputers are usually required to process computer tomography (CT) images.

The research group Vision Lab at the University of Antwerp came up with a different solution and constructed a PC that integrates four GeForce 9800 GX2 graphic cards (with a total of eight GPU cores) that runs CUDA-optimized tomography applications. The specifications include a MSI K9A2 Platinum motherboard, an AMD Phenom 9850 CPU, 4 x 2 GB Corsair TWINX DDR2 PC6400 memory, a Samsung Spinpoint F1 750 GB hard drive, a Thermaltake Toughpower 1500W Modular power supply unit as well as four MSI 9800GX2 cards. The researchers said that the cost of the system was less than 4000 Euro or about $5300.

It isn’t quite a tricked-out gaming system and the 3DMark06 score is just above what you average PC can manage to come with today (12,603 points). However, it is the CUDA application where this PC really shines. Compared to the 512-processor, $4.6 CalcUA supercomputer purchased in 2005, the PC can be more than a match: The projection of image slices took 23.4 seconds on the supercomputer and 35.1 seconds on the PC. The reconstruction of the slices was displayed after 67.4 seconds on the supercomputer systems and after just 52.2 seconds on the PC. The Vision Lab crew now believes that a real-time construction is possible through GPUs and is now building a cluster of such systems.."

Such is the power and performance of modern graphics chips in floating point/parrellel processing that nothing but another graphics chip can keep up with one. Gaming is heading rapidly in the direction of photo realism on the extreme high end of machines.

When direct3d 11 compatible GPU's come out, the shaders will be even more programable and we may see a blurring of the lines between traditional GPU/CPU positions. The future of consoles will be interesting won't they? What direction will they take?

So Moore's Law is really showing off these days.

Yes, as well as Moore's prediction that transistors can only get so small. thats why we are seeing odd configurations such as quad core processors and diiferent achetectures such as the cell and the triple cored Xbox 360. Just one core can't cut it anymore and speeds cannot be increased exponentially as they have in years past. Just wait til we have hex-core processors and quad core GPU's. Programmers will throw fits trying to balance the workloads on those things.

^Memristors and quantum computers will really turn things upside down.

 Oh geez the thought 3 states of processing (1,0, and both at once) fills me with a strange sense of dread.

Edit: Holy crap i just read the wikipedia on memristors, latches made with this type of device can be used to store 100 gigabyes in a 1 cm² area. The speed is about 1/10 of DRAM but thatis still way faster than any hard drive can ever hope to be!