Less than a month after it took the stealth shield off of its data centre operations, Yahoo is again making news with the construction of what the company claims may be the world’s most energy efficient data centre.
According to this blog post by David Filo, co-founder and Chief Yahoo, the company’s new data centre, to be build in Lockport, New York will feature a new customised design that enable it to achieve an annualized average PUE, or power usage effectiveness, of 1.1 or better. PUE measures the amount of energy that actually powers the IT equipment compared to the amount of energy that is delivered to the site. A 1.1 PUE means that for every unit of electricity that powers the servers, only 10% (0.1 of the PUE) more is needed to handle the cooling and other passive infrastructure.
To put that into perspective, Google’s data centres have an average PUE of 1.16, with the most efficient running at 1.12 PUE. Yahoo recently revealed that its Quincy, Washington data centre was running at an PUE of 1.21. Legacy data centres typically run at a PUE of around 2, according to various studies and the US EPA.
The new Yahoo Lockport data centre features what the company is calling, the Yahoo! Computer Coop, because, Filo wrote, “it looks like something chickens live in.” According to Filo, it is a building that is angled to take advantage of Buffalo’s microclimate, enabling the data centre to use 100% outside air to cool the servers. Read the rest
Alcatel-Lucent has launched what it calls a “high-capacity and eco-efficient” DSL platform, which now consumes 25% less power than conventional DSL solutions. According to the company, the ‘green DSL’ platform leverages increased energy efficiency of its latest generation DSL line cards, a unique distributed DSLAM concept, and something called Smart DSL technology.
“Today, standards exist that allow modems to go in a low-power mode when user traffic is low. However, re-activating these modems causes power fluctuations - resulting in crosstalk and destabilizing the network,” said Jurgen Lison, Vice-President of Alcatel-Lucent’s ISAM product unit. “Alcatel-Lucent’s green DSL provides operators with a unique, end-to-end solution that overcomes these issues — enabling a significant reduction of the modems’ power consumption across a service provider’s subscriber base without causing any line stability issues. This is a value proposition that cannot be provided by any other vendor in the industry today.” Read the rest
If you have an answer, then get out your video camera/cameraphone/digital camera, and record a shot clip of the reasons and you’ll stand a chance of winning up to US$3,000.
Cisco’s TelePresence team is now running a user submitted video contest/campaign to promote the HD video conferencing platform. You can get more information here.
“This new contest is designed to entice individuals from around the world to submit their ideas about why or how they would like to use Cisco TelePresence. Winners in two categories, Productivity and Shaping the Future, have a chance to win $3,000 each,” a Cisco spokesperson said. “They don’t have to be Ridley Scott or Cecil B. DeMille – all they need is a home video camera, some passion and a tad of creativity. Most digital cameras can record short form videos, and the site is set up for easy uploading and includes a simple pass along feature. ” Read the rest
Three global carriers and Cisco Systems has completed a successful trial of the latter’s TelePresence system across multi-carrier networks, paving the way for the day when HD video conferencing may be use like today’s PSTN.
The proof-of-concept trial by AT&T, BT and Tata Communications, was carried out at the Cisco Live 2009 event, and involved AT&T sites in Bedminster and Morristown, NJ., and Chicago, IL., a BT site in Colorado Springs, a Cisco site in San Francisco and Tata sites in Boston and London. Read the rest
After its push into smart grids, Cisco Systems has identified another major segment where its technology can play a role in the fight against climate change - buildings.
The company announced (officially - since it has already done a lot of work in the area) Smart Connected Buildings as its latest emerging technology, which is now pegged as a key component in delivering on its vision for Smart+Connected Communities, which in turn is one of 30 key markets adjacencies the company has identified.
According to Cisco, Smart+Connected Communities addresses the growing need for sustainable energy to meet the demand of increasingly urbanized populations by providing a network-enabled blueprint for successful smart cities of the future that run on networked information. Read the rest
In a presentation to a conference in San Francisco, Willy Chiu, vice president of IBM Cloud Labs, revealed major government initiatives to adopt cloud computing in China and Vietnam, as well as major cloud initiatives in South Africa and the Middle East.
Chiu says that in rolling out cloud platforms across the world, IBM is now helping the governments to bring e-government services onto cloud-based computing platforms, according to this report in Information Week.
The revelation follows major cloud computing announcements by governments in Japan, the US and the UK to adopt a centralized shared platform for government IT requirements. Read the rest
Cisco sees virtualisation underpinning a major move to the cloud over the next few years and is locking in a strategy for extending the role of the network in the transition. CommsDay attended an international roundtable, led by CTO Padmasree Warrior and software group SVP Doug Dennerline via multi-point videoconference, that outlined the network giant’s strategy for the cloud.
“Virtualisation is emerging as a disruption because it allows us to abstract, or separate away, the application and services from the underlying infrastructure, so that we can realise much more flexibility with respect to providing resources on demand – whether it’s computing services or other resources in the data centre,” said Warrior. “Along the same lines, we are seeing the emergence of cloud computing.” Read the rest
US video operators may use cloud storage techniques in lieu of DVRs to provide time-shift viewing services. That’s the upshot of a Supreme Court refusal to hear a legal challenge to Cablevision Systems’ proposed VOD service, which sparked Hollywood outrage by replacing set-top boxes with centralized remote servers housed at its own facilities.
Several copyright holders including the four broadcast networks sued to stop the plan, arguing the service would violate federal law and serve as an unlicensed VOD platform. Cablevision spun the offering as a way to extend DVR functionality while cutting costs. The decision to uphold a lower court appeal could have significant impact on the set-top box market as rival operators are almost certain to pursue their own cloud DVR services. Read the rest
Several top handset makers including Nokia have agreed to develop a universal charger for the European market.
Ten suppliers inked a memorandum of understanding to use Micro USB connectors for their phone chargers rather than continue forward with the countless proprietary formats that have bedeviled consumers.
The agreement was prompted by a European Commission threat to legislate conformity and comes into effect next year. Previously, the industry, led by the GSMA, have pledged to develop a universal charge by 2012. Read the rest
If your answer is no, or you’re not sure, you are hardly alone according to a new survey of IT professionals by document management company, Version One.
The survey of 60 senior IT professionals found 41% who admitted that they “don’t know” what cloud computing is. Of the remaining 59% of IT professionals who profess to know what cloud computing is, 17% of these understand cloud computing to be internet-based computing while 11% believe it is a combination of internet-based computing, software as a service (SAAS), software on demand, an outsourced or managed service and a hosted software service. The remaining respondents understand cloud computing to be a mixture of the above. Read the rest
According to this blog post by David Filo, co-founder and Chief Yahoo, the company’s new data centre, to be build in Lockport, New York will feature a new customised design that enable it to achieve an annualized average PUE, or power usage effectiveness, of 1.1 or better. PUE measures the amount of energy that actually powers the IT equipment compared to the amount of energy that is delivered to the site. A 1.1 PUE means that for every unit of electricity that powers the servers, only 10% (0.1 of the PUE) more is needed to handle the cooling and other passive infrastructure. 
