[Beowulf] Servers Too Hot? Intel Recommends a Luxurious Oil Bath

[Ellis H. Wilson III]

On 09/05/2012 01:19 PM, Robert G. Brown wrote:
> On Wed, 5 Sep 2012, Gregory Matthews wrote:
>
>> On 05/09/12 14:59, Ellis H. Wilson III wrote:
>>> They save money because a) they can chill things much more easily (less
>>> chillers), and moreover with a dense substance they can pipe it chilled
>>> much farther (distance to chiller is far less important), unlike they
>>> currently cannot with air.  So instead of a tall building with expensive
>>
>> er.. don't the chillers actually chill water/glycol rather than air?
>> This is what is piped around...
>
> Piped around through well-insulated pipes, in fact, much as it is at
> institutions like Duke for the more mundane purpose of chilling air in
> offices.  A good sized office building consumes many watts, and all of
> it has to be removed to maintain working temperatures inside.
>
> The point is that one doesn't have to be that close to the chillers --
> it isn't a strong constraint on cluster growth.  Furthermore, I'd bet

Doh!  Yes, good points by both of you.  Wasn't thinking clearly this 
morning.

For anyone who is interested, there is an old but solid video Google put 
out on their (now dated 2005) architecture at the following link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRwPSFpLX8I

Best,

ellis