Playstation 3 Consoles Tackle Black Hole Vibrations
When black holes are perturbed, they vibrate somewhat like a ringing bell. Now astronomers have narrowed down the rotational speed at which that vibration should stop.
As is typical, they did it out by running a simulation. But instead of a supercomputer, they used a batch of Sony Playstation 3 gaming consoles wired together.
The so-called PS3 Gravity Grid, a network of 16 Playstation 3 consoles grouped together in a cluster capable of running simulations that rival a dedicated supercomputer at a much lower cost.
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/090128-playstation3-blackholes.html
XBox fanboy here, but still pretty cool. Click on the link 'so-called gravity grid' to see a picture of the Playstation 3 super computer.
