What is the fastest sorting algorithm for a small number of integers?

Question

I am wondering what the fastest algorithm would be for this. I have 8 integers between 0 and 3000 and I need to sort them. Although there are only 8 integers, this operation w

Answer 1

Years later) for up to 32 inputs, see the Sorting network generator. For 8 inputs, it gives 19 swaps, like Sven Marnach's answer:

o--^--^--------^--------------------------o
   |  |        |
o--v--|--^--^--|--^--^--------------------o
      |  |  |  |  |  |
o--^--v--|--v--|--|--|--^--------^--------o
   |     |     |  |  |  |        |
o--v-----v-----|--|--|--|--^--^--|--^--^--o
               |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
o--^--^--------v--|--v--|--|--|--v--|--v--o
   |  |           |     |  |  |     |
o--v--|--^--^-----v-----|--|--|-----v-----o
      |  |  |           |  |  |
o--^--v--|--v-----------v--|--v-----------o
   |     |                 |
o--v-----v-----------------v--------------o


There are 19 comparators in this network,
grouped into 7 parallel operations.

[[0,1],[2,3],[4,5],[6,7]]
[[0,2],[1,3],[4,6],[5,7]]
[[1,2],[5,6],[0,4],[3,7]]
[[1,5],[2,6]]
[[1,4],[3,6]]
[[2,4],[3,5]]
[[3,4]]