Heat, computers, etc.

[Richard Walsh]

James Lux wrote:

>An interesting column from Robert X. Cringely talking about infrastructure 
>issues, particularly power density in racked computers.
>
>http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20031106.html
>

Jim and All,

Another paper I have found useful on the same subject is amoung the ADC
white paper list (paper #46) at:

http://www.apc.com/tools/mytools/index.cfm?action=search&category=whitepaper

Search with power, cooling, and racks. It makes the point that the goal 
should not be simply to endlessly reduce rack square footage because high
power density models have non-linear affects on ancillary power and cooling 
costs both in terms of the square feet they occupy on their own and their 
intrinsic cost.  ADC posits this begins to occur around 4 KW per rack. 

The bottom line then (if you believe them) is that as per rack compute 
density goes up per chip wattage (and general per node wattage) must go 
down to retain the savings of a smaller foot print.

Regards,

rbw
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