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The Cloud Computer

oxide.computer

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Re: The Cloud Computer

#11

Post by fefe23 »

This is actually a pretty big deal.

They sell servers, but as a finished product. Not as a cobbled together mess of third party stuff where the vendor keeps shrugging if there is an integration problem. They integrated it. It comes with all the features they expect you to want if you wanted to build your own cloud.

Also, they wrote the software. And it's all open source. So no "sorry but the third party vendor dropped support for the bios". You get the source code. Even if Oxide goes bust, you can still salvage things in a pinch.

Ironically this looks like the realization of Richard Stallman's dream where users can help each other if something doesn't work.

Re: The Cloud Computer

#12

Post by dewey »

I always thought it's just about the hardware but it seems like it also includes it's own kind of virtualization / provisioning interface for VMs, firewalls and also an overview over running software.

Does this "lock" you into the Oxide platform and you just buy into the whole thing instead of buying some server from Dell, then running some Proxmox like software and a Docker host?

Re: The Cloud Computer

#13

Post by api »

I saw a demo from them and it looked nice but then they told me they are stopping at the VM and storage blob level of abstraction.

Virtually all the value we get from cloud is in their managed offerings of complex and difficult to admin systems like Kubernetes, Postgres, and managed storage layers.

That’s where all the value is but it’s also where all the cost is. If you just want compute, storage, and bandwidth all those can be had at commodity prices. Look at Hetzner, Hivelocity, FDCServers, DataPacket, OVH, or VPS providers like Vultr. You can get dozens of cores, terabytes of SSD, and gigabits of unmetered bandwidth for a few thousand dollars or less. It’s very cheap.

Without the high level managed stuff we would be off cloud five minutes from now.

I’m sure there is a market for this among people who run on premise data centers, but I think they would have a much larger market if they went further up the software stack. Right now they just look like they are competing with Dell and Supermicro, not Amazon or Google Cloud.

Re: The Cloud Computer

#14

Post by hotpotamus »

XorNot wrote: post #2

Is this a big deal? I clicked on this skeptically, but...it actually seems like kind of a big deal? It is at least technically impressive, since it seems like they're eliminated a ton of datacenter pain points with the mechanical design.

It sort of reminds me of a Dell blade chassis that I pulled out of a DC last year - it was pretty impressive tech that I hadn't dealt with. 6 power supplies that I think could take 110v or 220v, but you needed 220v for full capacity. All of them were hot-swappable and as long as you had 3 powered it would keep running. The compute sleds were modular and it also had integrated networking as mentioned in this article. All obviously crafted to a very high standard; even the plastic fan cages felt premium (and I'm told it cost accordingly back in 2010 or so).

Also a former employer who was a bit below the hyperscaler level also had what they called "roll-in racks", though I believe they were just taking standard servers and networking gear and integrating them somewhere (presumably with cheap labor) and then bringing them into the DC as needed.

So I don't think it's a particularly new concept, but I agree it looks like it has some potential as a product.

Re: The Cloud Computer

#15

Post by roland35 »

XorNot wrote: post #2

Is this a big deal? I clicked on this skeptically, but...it actually seems like kind of a big deal? It is at least technically impressive, since it seems like they're eliminated a ton of datacenter pain points with the mechanical design.

Oxide is a bit of a darling child on HN - I think a lot of people (myself included) find it interesting that they are trying to re-engineer something somewhat commoditized and boring (servers) into something cool

Re: The Cloud Computer

#16

Post by weystrom »

> Everyone at Oxide makes $201,227 USD, regardless of location.

Man I would love to work for a company like that. I don't know why more people don't set their startups like that.

Re: The Cloud Computer

#17

Post by NKosmatos »

cpursley wrote: post #3

Can somebody explain in a sentence or two what this actually is and what the benefits are?

I'll second that, they should make it clear what they're selling and what they have to offer. Every company should have this in their main/landing page... If I can't understand what you're selling/offering in 30sec, then I'm not interested :-)

If you take some time and read around their site you'll see that they're offering a ready to run (turnkey) server. They have everything packed together, they've integrated everything that is needed (CPU, disk, networking...) into a nice looking cabinet, with not too many wires and they're selling it as a complete package.

If you're in need of a server (cloud computer) and you don't want to but separate components and unpack them and connect them yourself, then this looks like a possible solution.

Re: The Cloud Computer

#18

Post by throw0101a »

cpursley wrote: post #3

Can somebody explain in a sentence or two what this actually is and what the benefits are?

Designing a hardware-software combination to allow for the managing of compute (and networking and storage) to occur at the rack-level rather at the individual-device (server, switch, etc) level, so that large(r)-scale operators can manage cattle more easily (rather than herding cats/pets).

Re: The Cloud Computer

#19

Post by 7thaccount »

andrewstuart wrote: post #7
cpursley wrote: post #3

Can somebody explain in a sentence or two what this actually is and what the benefits are?

Weird there’s no mention of GPU at all when you’d think that’s what would prick up the ears of the hosting companies ….. stack a pile of GPUs in a rack, surely you can sell time on that. The Oxide machines seem to be aimed at 2020.

I don't think they're trying to be AWS. They're trying to sell a product that greatly simplifies doing on-site cloud for companies. So they sell the physical hardware/software bundle and not time.

Re: The Cloud Computer

#20

Post by subarctic »

cpursley wrote: post #3

Can somebody explain in a sentence or two what this actually is and what the benefits are?

It's a rack of servers you can buy for a lot of money and put in a datacenter. And once you plug it in and turn it on and do whatever setup is required, you're supposed to be able to spin up vms on it.
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