None of the big “Wow!” algorithms can be run on it, since it is not a universal quantum computer. It won’t do any of the magical stuff that a universal quantum computer can do.
In simple terms, for a universal quantum computer, the relevant factor is size (ie number of entangled qbits) not speed. The size determines the size of a problem you can encode in it, and it offloads the computation to alternate universes (which might well not exist the same way this one does, that’s a matter of interpretation) so that it runs every possible permutation of your problem at once. Most quantum algorithms, like Shor’s algorithm, don’t give you the right answer every time, but the answer is trivial to check with a classical computer, so you just keep running it until it gives you the right answer.
The D-wave is not a universal quantum computer. When they claim eg 512 qbits, what they mean is nothing like what a 512 qbit universal quantum computer would do. Rather, it is 512 1-qubit (or maybe 256 2-qbit, it’s been a while since I looked at the details.) quantum computers running in parallel. This means it can’t do any of the crazy stuff you could do with a 512-qbit quantum computer.
That said, the D-wave does use quantum effects to do computation, and far outperforms classical computers at simulated annealing. Since simulated annealing is a very general optimization algorithm, which is not used that often, because it is computationally much less efficient than other available algorithms, there is a lot of potential for the D-wave to be useful. It’s not all smoke and mirrors, it’s definitely for real.
