can't help but feel that maybe you missed the point. The point is that an inexpensive single computer, programmed properly, can be seen to blow away gigantic, extremely expensive "big data"-programmed clusters.
if you wanted to run this same algorithm on a 'real' single computer with ecc and high-performance cores, nothing would stop you, and it would get even faster, and still be radically less expensive in every dimension than the "big data" clusters, for this problem set.
Didn't miss the point at all. Lamenting lack of reliable laptops. Well, at least with reliable memory. You can buy a laptop with ECC RAM in the display adapter, but not as main memory! Sigh.
Luckily networking is getting so good that remote desktops feel almost like local most of the time.
if you wanted to run this same algorithm on a 'real' single computer with ecc and high-performance cores, nothing would stop you, and it would get even faster, and still be radically less expensive in every dimension than the "big data" clusters, for this problem set.