New Software Accommodates Big Datasets, Complex Calculations
 
London UK, 2nd November 2010 Palisade Corporation has announced the 5.7 release of its best-selling DecisionTools Suite, now available with support for 64-bit Excel 2010.  The suite is an integrated set of seven quantitative analysis tools that run in Microsoft Excel and are widely used for decision support in business, finance, engineering and science.  In recent years, computational tasks such as Monte Carlo simulation and neural networks have moved into the enterprise mainstream, and the data available for analysis have increased exponentially.  As a result, decision-makers across industry sectors have often hit computational ceilings as their models become too big for their existing hardware to handle. 

64-bit architecture allows computers to access more memory at once. While a traditional 32-bit system “maxes out” at around 4 gigabytes of memory, 64-bit systems can utilise terabytes worth of data.  New 64-bit hardware, operating systems (like Windows 7), and software (like Excel 2010) enable the creation of larger, more complex models.  With 64-bit systems, there is virtually no limit to model sizes or computational power.  64-bit architecture also dovetails nicely with the widespread availability of multicore processors and the growth of high performance computing (HPC) clusters.  The combination breaks new ground in business and science, allowing fast, timely analysis of the largest models.
 
The DecisionTools and What They Do
Moving the DecisionTools Suite into the 64-bit 2010 Excel environment will give the advantage of enhanced computational space and power to each tool in the suite:
• @RISK: risk and probability analysis via Monte Carlo simulation
• PrecisonTree: decision tree analysis that accounts for uncertainty
• TopRank: automated “what if” sensitivity analysis
• NeuralTools: predictive analysis with neural networks
• StatTools: advanced statistical analysis and time-series forecasting
• Evolver: genetic algorithm optimisation
• RISKOptimizer: simultaneous optimisation and probability analysis

The Tools Running in the 64-Bit Environment
The roomy 64-bit environment makes even formidable modeling tasks manageable.  This is especially true for @RISK, the flagship tool in the suite, because Monte Carlo simulation can make heavy computational demands.  As one beta tester commented, “@RISK 5.7 ran fine in my 64 bit version of Excel 2010. I even noticed that it used all 8 cores of my processor to run a 10,000-iteration simulation of a fairly complex pricing model in less than 1 minute. Very impressive.”

Randy Heffernan, vice president at Palisade said, “Although the 64-bit architecture has been around for quite some time, both as a feature of supercomputers and as a concept for PCs, its adoption by Excel creates new possibilities for risk and decision analysts deploying big, multilayered models,” Moving with Excel into the 64-bit environment allows us to develop more potent capabilities within @RISK and the DecisonTools Suite.”