Meta’s efficient datacenter design [/ˈmeta’s ɪˈfɪʃənt ˈdatasenter dɪˈzaɪn/] n - Meta’s efficiency story is bound to the Open Compute Project (OCP), begun in 2011. The governing thought was that the traditional server vendor builds machines for a generic customer, while Meta wanted machines for a most particular workload. To open the designs compelled the same rethinking upon the building itself.

Wherein They Differ

• Open hardware. [/ˈɒpɛn ˈhærdwærɛ/] n Publishing server, storage, and rack designs lets the whole industry optimize for the same workload, and strips away the proprietary margins and black boxes wherein inefficiency hides.
• Building as a system. [/ˈbʌɪldɪng ˈæs ˈæ ˈsistɛm/] n Meta designs the building, the power distribution, and the cooling around the rack. A 100% outside-air cooled hall in a cold climate is a different building from an evaporatively cooled hall in a hot one.
• Higher inlet temperatures. [/ˈhɪghɛr ˈɪnlɛt ˈtɛmpɛrætʌrɛs/] n Open Compute servers are built to run at warmer inlet temperatures than traditional enterprise gear, which widens the hours in which free cooling suffices.
• Simpler redundancy. [/ˈsɪmplɛr ˈrɛdʌndænki/] n The software layer absorbs failures, so the power and cooling layers need not be so fearful. The facility remains reliable, but reliable in a manner fitted to the software.
• Scale as a forcing function. [/ˈskælɛ ˈæs ˈæ ˈfɒrkɪng ˈfʌnktɪɒn/] n When one builds millions of servers, a few watts per box becomes a power plant, and that changes which optimizations merit the engineering hours.

What a Smaller Site May Borrow

• Standardize on a few server designs. Variation is costly in inventory, training, and spare parts.
• Match cooling to climate. Do not buy a chiller where the outer air will serve.
• Raise inlet temperatures with care. Most modern gear endures more than legacy guidelines allow; test and measure.
• Treat the software layer as part of the reliability design. A facility too conservative for the true failure tolerance of its workload wastes money.

A Facebook datacenter server board, showing the stripped-down design typical of Open Compute hardware. Photo by Intel Free Press, licensed CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

See Efficient datacenter case studies for the other cases and The Engines of the Hall for the chain these designs optimize.