Platforms and Licences

Licence options

• Pricing categories depend on platform and can be Silver, Gold or Platinum.
• All licence categories are available as sequential or parallel (single or multiple CPU) licences.
• GPU processing is a standard option included with all licences.
• A GUI-only version (kernel included, but limited to 32 MByte) is available. This is typically used as the desktop interface in a multi-user configuration.
• Additional licences for CAD import and export are available.
• Floating licences are supported via single or redundant licence server configurations.
• Dongle licencing is supported for multiple installations of a single licence. Note that dongle licencing is only supported for Windows and Linux on IA32, AMD64, EM64T, and IA64 platforms.
• FEKO LITE is a limited, licenced, but FREE version of FEKO.
• Educational licence options are available for academic institutions or creators of teaching material.

Silver, Gold and Platinum Licences

The difference between Silver, Gold and Platinum licences of FEKO is that Silver is built for 32-bit operating systems and Gold and Platinum are built for 64-bit operating systems.

The benefits of 64-bit over 32-bit operating systems can be summarised as follows:

Solver

• 32-bit (Silver) operating systems can only address 2 GByte of RAM per process and therefore the operating system limits the size and range of frequencies that problems can be solved for.
• 64-bit (Gold and Platinum) operating systems can address an unlimited amount of memory and therefore have no theoretical limit as to the size of frequency range where problems can be solved.

User Interface

• 64-bit (Gold and Platinum category) operating systems use 64-bit versions of the FEKO user interface (CADFEKO, POSTFEKO, etc.) and therefore can render and mesh larger sized models than 32-bit operating systems.  (32-bit operating systems have been found to be limited to approximately 1 million elements).

The following table is intended to highlight the range of CPU and operating system architectures that FEKO works with and how licencing differs for different architectures.

The nature of electromagnetic simulation is that computer resource requirements grow rapidly as problem size and complexity increase.  In such scenarios that the efficient parallel processing capabilities of FEKO becomes critically important. The above mentioned architectures can be networked to form cluster computers and can be integrated into large-scale server computers for improved simulation performance.

Examples of such systems include:

• Linux-based clusters using the Intel Cluster Ready architecture OR
• Intel Xeon Processor based clusters, running Linux, using the Intel Cluster Ready architecture
• SGI Altix systems.
• Generic Beowulf clusters (also multi-core nodes)

Various interconnecting technologies are supported by FEKO, including:

• NumaFlex for SGI Altix systems
• Infiniband through DAPL
• GigaBit Ethernet
• Myrinet

Sequential and Parallel Licencing

FEKO licences CPUs (not cores) and has two types of licence:

• Sequential, a single CPU licence.
• Parallel, multiple CPU licence.

Sequential

A sequential licence may run a simulation in parallel on all the physical cores of one multi-core CPU.  E.g. 4 cores can simulate in parallel on a quad-core CPU.

Parallel

A parallel licence may run a simulation in parallel on all the cores of the number of CPUs that the licence is valid for.  E.g. 8 cores can simulate in parallel with a parallel licence for 2 quad-core CPUs.

GPU Licencing

FEKO includes GPU processing as a standard option of all versions of the software and no extra licencing fees apply to GPU acceleration.

GPU usage is, however, limited to one GPU per CPU core for technical implementation reasons.  This means that for a quad-core CPU four GPUs can be used while running a parallel simulation.

GUI Licences

• The Graphical User Interface (GUI) is available for Windows and Linux and forms part of Silver and Gold licences.
• A GUI-only version is available that includes a limited version of the FEKO kernel (32 MByte RAM restriction).
• Two GUI-only licences are included per Platinum licence (as the FEKO GUI is not available on Platinum platforms).
• Additional GUI-only licences can be purchased.

CAD Import and Export Filters

• The CADFEKO and Parasolid import and export modules are a standard component of CADFEKO. The other modules require additional licences.
• The following CAD import and export modules are available:

Mesh import modules

The following mesh import modules are available on all versions of FEKO:

• FEMAP neutral, NASTRAN, AutoCAD DXF, STL, PATRAN, ANSYS CDB, Concept, ABAQUS, NEC, GiD

Academic Licence Options

The following table summarises the licences that can be used in an academic environment. For more detailed information on the suitability of each licence for a specific educational purpose, whether for use by under-graduate students, post-graduate students or lecturers, visit the FEKO academic support page.