NCI for USyd researchers

National Computational Infrastructure (NCI) is a services facility that provides high performance computing (HPC), cloud computing, and data services to Australian researchers.

Our institutional HPC ‘Artemis’ will be decommissioned on 29 August 2025. NCI has been chosen as the replacement computing platform. All staff and students with a valid University of Sydney unikey can access NCI computing time under the NCI-Sydney Scheme. A pre-recorded information session summarising the Sydney Scheme and how to access NCI is available to view.

If HPC is not suitable for your workload, please consider NCI cloud or virtual research desktops. We are confident that your research computing will be well-supported by these platforms.

This site is focused on the use of NCI’s Gadi HPC, in the context of University of Sydney researchers.

Please be mindful this is not an exhaustive resource for using Gadi. It is only intended to orient you to the system and navigate the comprehensive NCI user documentation.

What is high performance computing?

High performance computing refers to the use of parallel processing techniques to solve complex computation problems efficiently. HPC systems, like Gadi, consist of clusters of interconnected computers, each equipped with multiple processors and large amounts of memory. These systems are capable of handling massive datasets and perform computations at speeds far beyond those achievable by your personal computer.

Why do we need HPC for research computing?

Research computing comes in all shapes and sizes. In some cases, your compute needs are well-met by your personal computer or a web-based platform. In other cases, these platforms are not sufficient and this is where HPC is critical to ensuring a timely analysis of your data.

To use HPC, it is not a requirement that your workflow makes use of the multi-node architecture. There are many reasons why HPC would be justified:

  • Large input data requiring vast physical storage for inputs and outputs
  • High CPU or node requirement
  • GPU requirement
  • High memory requirement
  • Long walltime requirement
  • Faster I/O operations than your local computer can handle
  • Freeing up your local computer resources for other tasks, or simply to shut down for the day without affecting the compute analysis you are running

HPC provides a reliable and efficient means of analysing data of all shapes and sizes from all research domains.

Support

SIH is limited in the support it can provide for NCI Gadi users. If you are new to HPC and Gadi, we expect you will attend NCI’s Intro to Gadi courses. Additionally, familiarise yourself with Gadi using the NCI Gadi user guide.

Live and self-directed training is also offered by SIH and NCI on HPC and data analysis topics:

For additional support, please contact the following people depending on your needs:

Type of issue Who How Details
Service unit allocation for running jobs. Request for g/data storage. SIH Make a request Sydney Documentation
A technical issue with NCI. An error in your running job. New software installation. NCI Helpdesk Log an NCI ticket Provide your error, log file, jobid. Versions or links for installs.
A bug in an SIH pipeline SIH Submit an issue on Github Provide details e.g. this issue
General research computing or data analysis advice SIH Log an SIH ticket Provide relevant context, errors, tool names, scripts