Redefining data Center Understanding Liquid Cooling server development trend

With the rapid development of mobile data, cloud computing and large data business, the scale of data center construction is increasing, and the demand of data center owners for energy Saving in data center is becoming more and more prominent. In recent years, there have been many data center energy-saving new technologies, but they have not broken the thinking bottleneck, has been concerned about the data center infrastructure level of its own technology innovation, not the server facilities into the data center energy-saving projects, unified, systematic thinking of the data center energy-saving problem, It is difficult to break the 1.60 limit of the design Pue value of the data center.

Shuguang Liquid Cooling Server PHPC300

Industry criticism Puzzles Data center to reduce energy consumption

The internet bubble before and after 2000, left the technology legacy for mankind is the revolution of server form and the revolution of data center construction idea----because of the large-scale application of the server, the rack server replaced the tower server; At the same time, it causes the revolution of the data center construction----from the computer room environment to the micro environment of the cabinet, the elevated ground plate data center becomes the construction standard of the data center.

In the following decade, the data center market has gradually entered a period of rapid development. The rack of IT equipment saves the physical space of the data center while increasing the power density of the cabinet. The power density of data center gradually develops from low density to medium density, and there are many technical problems such as local hotspot. Unfortunately, the industry is not aware of these emerging technology issues as a harbinger of a new era of higher power density, without serious thought of the answer, but an irresponsible attempt to use traditional solutions to new problems. As a result, the data Center energy consumption index PUE value, although from the initial 3.00 gradually reduced to 2.00 below, but has been difficult to break through 1.60.

The reason is the lack of http://www.aliyun.com/zixun/aggregation/31091.html "> Technology development strategy of industry integration thinking." In fact, the equipment or components that contribute the most to the energy consumption of the data center----CPU, memory, server cooling system, data center air conditioning system, data center UPS system, the related industries are researching and developing energy-saving technology alone, and most of the industry field's technological innovation potential has been exhausted. If we do not change the technology strategy and the way of thinking, it is impossible to produce big technological achievements.

Some industry leaders at home and abroad are aware of the problem and are beginning to take action. At present, there are two main technical directions: high temperature air-cooled server with data center, fresh air Direct natural cooling technology, and liquid cooling server with data center water system or fluorine system indirect natural cooling technology. The former rely on improving the server heat source grade and special climate environment to achieve energy saving, the latter relies on reducing heat transfer process of thermal grade loss to achieve energy saving.

In 2013, Facebook disclosed its data center in the Swedish northern town of Luleå (Lule), using the new air direct natural cooling technology. Luleå is located on the northern coast of the Baltic Sea, just 100 kilometers from the Arctic Circle, and the local climate factor is one of the important reasons Facebook chose to set up data in Luleå. According to Facebook, since 1961, the temperature of Luleå is no more than 30 degrees, more than 24 hours, and the establishment of data centers in the region will save a large amount of cooling costs. However, from the domestic climatic conditions, the south of the high temperature, the northern areas of sand, similar to the Luleå so that the location of the ideal location of the data center is very few;

Liquid-cooled server technology is rarely limited, because the technology does not require air access to the data center, or even air access to the server.

As early as a few years ago, companies such as IBM developed an indirect liquid-cooled server with water as a working medium instead of air-cooled servers, to significantly improve pue indicators because they realize that air as a refrigerant is far from ideal, and that water is 1000 times times more efficient than air cooling. The so-called indirect liquid cold, refers to the liquid is not in contact with the heating parts, but through the cold plate, Lengzang and other liquid and heating parts isolated.

And the United States Intel and the United States 3M took another route, the use of special liquids directly with the heating parts of the heat transfer, that is, direct-type liquid cooling server technology, or immersion liquid cooling server technology. This requires finding a technology that is directly in contact with heating components with electromagnetic compatibility, electrical compatibility, physical compatibility, and chemical compatibility. Zhongke Shuguang since 2010 to study liquid cooling server technology, the future direction of liquid cooling server, and the United States 3M Company is "Great minds", in many technical aspects of innovation, formed a new technology system.

Liquid cooling server To create a new benchmark for industry consumption

Dawn has been dedicated to the research of efficient refrigeration technology, and constantly applied to the products to benefit the vast number of dawning customers. Zhongke Shuguang cloudbase® Series c1000/2000/3000/4000 program, are aimed at air-cooled server, the use of airflow optimization (including pool level, row level and cabinet level), temperature and humidity control decoupling, fluorine pump natural cooling and other mature technology specific implementation plan, According to the current operating data of these schemes in China, the Pue value of the data center has been successfully reduced from 2.00 to 1.60.

Dawning liquid cooling server in Leipzig, Germany ISC ' 14 live show

At present, the latest liquid cooling server technology, is the dawn of the department to use their own in-depth understanding of the requirements of the server and server development of the technical strength of the results of the innovation. From the current laboratory data, the use of liquid cooling Server data center, with efficient fluorine pump circulatory system, you can remove the compressor, the whole year in natural cooling operating conditions, so that the Pue value can easily be reduced from 1.60 to 1.20.

With the representative of the industry-leading level, the first domestic use of 3M company electronic refrigerant technology Direct immersion Liquid Cooling server release, its high availability, high-density, ultra-low pue and other advantages, will shake the industry for the data center energy conservation and reduce the technical awareness. From the aspect of cost analysis, although the liquid cooling server product of the Shuguang of the middle section is more than the manufacturing cost of the air-cooled server product, the reduction of the manufacturing cost of the supporting data center infrastructure will offset the partial cost increment, so that the overall capex of the data center has not changed significantly. However, the sharp reduction in opex caused by energy conservation has led to a significant reduction in TCO in the data center, an excellent economic performance that drives the industry's perception of the revolutionary technology.

At the dawn of the branch, the server liquid cooling technology is bound to bring the change of the physical form of the server, and bring the transformation of the data center construction mode, which has a profound influence on the information industry pattern.