IBM Uses Hot Water To Cool Super Computer

[Diogenes2]

IBM cools supercomputer with hot water

The system was built with new hot-water cooling technology from IBM that helps with both shrinking the size of the system (by a factor of 10) and with reducing its energy consumption compared with traditional designs, according to IBM research and development types.

Sort of counter-intuitive; but the idea is to save energy by not lowering the temp of the water below 45c .

 

[borisvodofsky]

IBM cools supercomputer with hot water

Sort of counter-intuitive; but the idea is to save energy by not lowering the temp of the water below 45c .

Wait, it's not cooled with HEATED water,

The water that is used to Cool the computer "GETs" hot.

I think there was a translation error somewhere.

They definitely would not HEAT the water then send it to the computers. :biggrin:

 

[Meghan54]

Wait, it's not cooled with HEATED water,

The water that is used to Cool the computer "GETs" hot.

I think there was a translation error somewhere.

They definitely would not HEAT the water then send it to the computers. :biggrin:

Damn, are you really this stupid? Did you even read the article? Because, wait, they're really using hot water, not cold.

No, from your reply, you didn't, only stopped in to show your ignorance once again. And I thought that thread in cpus was your crowning achievement.....this somehow beats that.

 

[Fallen Kell]

Yes, there is definitely a translation or headline error (I read the story the other day). All they do differently is that the heated water can be used for other needs in the building, like heating it in the winter. Ideally, it would be nice to use the hot water for all the building's needs, like heating its own hot water for bathrooms/kitchen usage, and possibly running heat pumps to generate some electricity back from the hot water, instead of just dumping it to cooling towers which most data centers currently do.

 

[Diogenes2]

I think you got it Meghan54..

The target temp of the water entering the blade is 45c...
Once the cooling loop is in operation, it is just a matter of ' cooling ' the water down to 45c, whether it it used for heating the building or not.

They have determined that cooling it lower than 45 is inefficient .. They are claiming a 40% energy savings over previous ' cold ' water systems.


I don't think IBM is having translation problems ..

 

[Pray To Jesus]

So water cooling > air cooling?

Whowouldathunkit?

 

[Vinwiesel]

So basically they are taking advantage of the fact that modern cpu/gpu's have a higher operating temp. They're obviously saving on cooling cost, but I'm curious what the difference in power consumption is by the system itself, since higher die temp translates to higher current draw.

 

[rickon66]

Here is a quote from the piece here on Anandtech:

"At the same time, by ditching traditional air cooling for a liquid coolant power costs to be cut by up to 40 percent over a traditional air design. The water is heated to a hotter than normal temperature via special microchannels in the cooling blocks, hence the "hot water" name. The heated fluid gets up to a toasty 113 degrees Fahrenheit, or 45 degrees Celsius, cutting the power consumed by cooling to around a fifth of the levels used in traditional designs."

The water starts cool and "gets" to 45 degrees C. by going through the water blocks. Megan54 you owe boris an apology for being so rude when he was correct all along.

 

[EarthwormJim]

Damn, are you really this stupid? Did you even read the article? Because, wait, they're really using hot water, not cold.

No, from your reply, you didn't, only stopped in to show your ignorance once again. And I thought that thread in cpus was your crowning achievement.....this somehow beats that.

I think you need to reexamine the article. They are not externally heating the water up, THEN pumping it into the mainframes.

The water is solely heated up by the supercomputer, they simply have a higher targeted water temperature than traditional water cooling. They make use of this higher temperature for heating throughout their facilities.

Since they're using direct die cooling with micro channels, they can probably achieve a very respectable Delta T between the CPUs and the water, probably under 20 C. A very low Delta T would be the only way this could really work.

No reason to be such a dick, especially when you yourself are wrong.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Interesting. My plan for my server room is all wrong then, I plan to cool it using cold water, so I'll have to heat the water first THEN send it to the rad.

 

[momeNt]

Damn, are you really this stupid? Did you even read the article? Because, wait, they're really using hot water, not cold.

No, from your reply, you didn't, only stopped in to show your ignorance once again. And I thought that thread in cpus was your crowning achievement.....this somehow beats that.

Learn the difference between the use of the words cool and heat when they are used as verbs and adjectives/nouns.

You should really be more careful before you go after someone like that by first making sure you are right. Did you have a bad day or something?

 

[EarthwormJim]

Interesting. My plan for my server room is all wrong then, I plan to cool it using cold water, so I'll have to heat the water first THEN send it to the rad.

No no, that's not what they're doing. They simply are aiming for a higher water temperature than usual, and using that as part of their HVAC system.

 

[Pooptacular]

Damn, are you really this stupid? Did you even read the article? Because, wait, they're really using hot water, not cold.

No, from your reply, you didn't, only stopped in to show your ignorance once again. And I thought that thread in cpus was your crowning achievement.....this somehow beats that.

LOL what a moron. Anyways, this is pretty cool. I do wonder if they really would save over a million bucks using this though.

 

[Red Squirrel]

No no, that's not what they're doing. They simply are aiming for a higher water temperature than usual, and using that as part of their HVAC system.

Oh ok, the way they explain it is kinda missleading. Normally when you refer to "hot water" it's water that has been preheated. Yeah that's pretty much what I plan to do at home once I setup my server room then. Water will flow through a radiator that's in the server room, exhaust air from the servers will flow through it and then back to the other side to go back through the servers. The water will then be pipped around the perimeter of the crawlspace where it tends to be a bit cooler than the rest of the house.

 

[wirednuts]

megahn54 please reply. this is way too funny. that or disable your account