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Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

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Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#231

Post by ceejayoz »

notpushkin wrote: post #91
mandevil wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

International space law (starting with the Outer Space Treaty of 1967) says that nations are responsible for all spacecraft they launch, no matter whether the government or a non-governmental group launches them. So a server farm launched by a Danish company is governed by Danish law just the same as if they were on the ground- and exposed to the same ability to put someone into jail if they don't comply with a legal…

What if you’re a stateless person? (Not an easy status to acquire these days, but any US citizen can just renounce their citizenship without getting a new one, for example.)

Being stateless has an end result of "literally anyone can fuck with you" more than "no one can fuck with you".

Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#232

Post by vidarh »

MobiusHorizons wrote: post #226
vidarh wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's likely the overall rate would be higher, and you might find you need more aggressive burn-in, but even then you'd need an extremely high failure rate before it's more efficient to replace components than writing them off.

The bathtub curve isn’t the same for all components of a server though. Writing off the entire server because a single ram chip or ssd or network card failed would limit the entire server to the lifetime of the weakest part. I think you would want redundant hot spares of certain components with lower mean time between failures.

We do often write off an entire server because a single component fails because the lifetime of the shortest-lifetime components is usually long enough that even on-earth with easy access it's often not worth the cost to try to repair. In an easy-to-access data centre, the component most likely to get replaced would be hot-swappable drives or power supplies, but it's been about 2 decades since the last time I worked anywhere where anyone bothered to check for failed RAM or failed CPUs to salvage a server. And lot of servers don't have network devices you can replace without soldering, and haven't for a long time outside of really high end networking.

And at sufficient scale, once you plan for that it means you can massively simplify the servers. The amount of waste a sever case suitable for hot-swapping drives adds if you're not actually going to use the capability is massive.

Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#233

Post by vidarh »

rtkwe wrote: post #207
btown wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://accendoreliability.com/the-bath-tub-curve-explained/ is an interesting breakdown of bath tub curve dynamics for those curious!

Wonder if you could game that in theory by burning in the components on the surface before launch or if the launch would cause a big enough spike from the vibration damage that it's not worth it.

I suspect you'd absolutely want to burn in before launch, maybe even including simulating some mechanical stress to "shake out" more issues, but it is a valid question how much burn in is worth doing before and after launch.

Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#234

Post by dapperdrake »

rtkwe wrote: post #207
btown wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://accendoreliability.com/the-bath-tub-curve-explained/ is an interesting breakdown of bath tub curve dynamics for those curious!

Wonder if you could game that in theory by burning in the components on the surface before launch or if the launch would cause a big enough spike from the vibration damage that it's not worth it.

Maybe they are different types of failure modes. Solar panel semiconductors hate vibration.

And then, there is of course radiation trouble.

So those two kinds of burn-in require a launch ti space anyway.

Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#235

Post by dapperdrake »

rajnathani wrote: post #159
vidarh wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had actual, real-life deployments in datacentres where we just left dead hardware in the racks until we needed the space, and we rarely did. Typically we'd visit a couple of times a year, because it was cheap to do so, but it'd have totally viable to let failures accumulate over a much longer time horizon. Failure rates tend to follow a bathtub curve, so if you burn-in the hardware before launch, you'd expect lo…

Exactly what I was thinking when the OP comment brought up "regular launches containing replacement hardware", this is easily solvable by actually "treating servers as cattle and not pets" whereby one would simply over-provision servers and then simply replace faulty servers around once per year. Side: Thanks for sharing about the "bathtub curve", as TIL and I'm surprised I haven't heard of this before especially as…

Ah, the good old BETA distribution.

Programming and CS people somehow rarely look at that.

Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#236

Post by dapperdrake »

VectorLock wrote: post #211
vidarh wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had actual, real-life deployments in datacentres where we just left dead hardware in the racks until we needed the space, and we rarely did. Typically we'd visit a couple of times a year, because it was cheap to do so, but it'd have totally viable to let failures accumulate over a much longer time horizon. Failure rates tend to follow a bathtub curve, so if you burn-in the hardware before launch, you'd expect lo…

The original article even addresses this directly. Plus hardware returns over fast enough that you'll simply be replacing modules with a smattering of dead servers with entirely new generations anyways.

Really? Even radiation hardened hardware? Aren’t there way higher size floors on the transistors?

Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#237

Post by dumah »

BruSwain wrote: post #92

If you are out of the magnetosphere, wouldn't your data be subject to way more cosmic ray interference, to the point that its actually a consideration?

Geostationary orbiters operate there during the day but this concept would position systems 100x closer to earth and well inside the protective envelope.

Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#238

Post by sheepybloke »

NitpickLawyer wrote: post #104
GlenTheMachine wrote: post #76

Space roboticist here. As with a lot of things, it isn't the initial outlay, it's the maintenance costs. Terrestrial datacenters have parts fail and get replaced all the time. The mass analysis given here -- which appears quite good, at first glance -- doesn't including any mass, energy, or thermal system numbers for the infrastructure you would need to have to replace failed components. As a first cut, this would re…

Appreciate the insights, but I think failing hardware is the least of their problems. In that underwater pod trial, MS saw lower failure rates than expected (nitrogen atmosphere could be a key factor there). > The company only lost six of the 855 submerged servers versus the eight servers that needed replacement (from the total of 135) on the parallel experiment Microsoft ran on land. It equates to a 0.7% loss in the…

The biggest difference is radiation. Even in LEO, you will get radiation-caused Single Events that will affect the hardware. That could be a small error or a destructive error, depending on what gets hit.

Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#239

Post by tessierashpool »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #218
vidarh wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had actual, real-life deployments in datacentres where we just left dead hardware in the racks until we needed the space, and we rarely did. Typically we'd visit a couple of times a year, because it was cheap to do so, but it'd have totally viable to let failures accumulate over a much longer time horizon. Failure rates tend to follow a bathtub curve, so if you burn-in the hardware before launch, you'd expect lo…

The analysis has zero redundancy for either servers or support systems. Redundancy is a small issue on Earth, but completely changes the calculations for space because you need more of everything, which makes the already-unfavourable space and mass requirements even less plausible. Without backup cooling and power one small failure could take the entire facility offline. And active cooling - which is a given at these…

even a swarm of satellites has risk factors. we treat space as if it were empty (it's in the name) but there's debris left over from previous missions. this stuff orbits at a very high velocity, so if an object greater than 10cm is projected to get within a couple kilometers of the ISS, they move the ISS out of the way. they did this in April and it happens about once a year.

the more satellites you put up there, the more it happens, and the greater the risk that the immediate orbital zone around Earth devolves into an impenetrable whirlwind of space trash, aka Kessler Syndrome.

Re: Starcloud can’t put a data centre in space at $8.2M in one Starship

#240

Post by bevr1337 »

literalAardvark wrote: post #161
looofooo0 wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Power!? Isnt that just PV and batteries? LEO has like 1.5h orbit.

It's a Datacenter... I guess solar is what they're planning to use, but the array will be so large it'll have its own gravity well

All mass has gravity
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