Groq investor sounds alarm on data centers • Hacker News Board

Re: Groq investor sounds alarm on data centers

#71

Post by blahlabs » Wed, Dec 31, 2025, 5:10 AM UTC

kijin wrote: post #70

franktankbank wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about a single beefcake server that runs dumb terminals throughout your house with a lightweight shim between each device and server. Sexy monitors just sitting there quiet AF. Mega room for coffee cups and niknaks across the desk. Ports for days. This is my dream. I'd keep it by my feet so I could pet it and say good job.

That would work if every family member were okay with dumb terminals. Unfortunately, some of them require dedicated GPUs. Routing thick black DP cables and bright blue USB throughout the house feels a lot less natural than just installing ethernet ports in each room. :(

I run my workstation PC with a dedicated GPU in a rack in the shed. I use Sunshine on the workstation and Moonlight on the client to access it. I can game like that, use blender for modelling, anything that needs more juice than my old laptop. It feels local. Even over WiFi I quite often forget I am on a remote machine. Moonlight runs on pretty much anything and everything too.

Re: Groq investor sounds alarm on data centers

#72

Post by NitpickLawyer » Wed, Dec 31, 2025, 5:29 AM UTC

yesco wrote: post #62

NitpickLawyer wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Don't these data centers have pretty elaborate cooling setups that use large volumes of water? Depending on where, and (more importantly) when you last read about this, there's been some developments. The original book that started this had a unit conversion error, and the reported numbers were off by about 4500x what the true numbers are (author claimed 1000 times more water than an entire city consumption, while…

I have no idea what book you're talking about, and I never claimed water "disappears" or made any argument about consumption statistics. Why would you assume I think water vanishes from existence? That's absurd. My point is simple: the utility infrastructure is the hard part. The silicon sitting on raised floors is disposable and will be obsolete in a few years. But the power substations, fiber connections, and water…

Sorry if it came out that way, it was not my intention. I just thought you asked and provided some info that I'd recently read.

Re: Groq investor sounds alarm on data centers

#73

Post by marcosdumay » Wed, Dec 31, 2025, 6:18 PM UTC

piker wrote: post #18

marcosdumay wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They are building too many steam engines. It's a bubble that's going to pop and leave investors empty handed. What a great analogy. People building too many steam engines was one of the main factors that lead to the first world war.

Sounds interesting. Do you have a source for that?

The most famous steam engine bubble in the 19th Century:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway_Mania

Those popped all over Europe during the entire century, with the last one popping at the 1890s. For some reason, people focus only on this large one on the UK.

Sources for how 19th Century imperialism had a lot of support from extend-and-pretend infrastructure bubbles are harder to search.

Re: Groq investor sounds alarm on data centers

#74

Post by SR2Z » Fri, Jan 02, 2026, 5:16 PM UTC

tharmas wrote: post #50

michaelteter wrote: post #28

Many of the crazy things we see happening today come from the same root problem: the wealth of humanity has increasingly been funneled into the hands of a few. These may be mostly companies rather than individuals, but they are a proxy for a relatively small few people. This glut of finances leaves those few with a problem: what to do with it? And since accumulation of wealth is the ultimate goal , FOMO encourages in…

> If resources were more evenly distributed, we would see different regions and peoples doing more varied things which would be appropriate for their needs. You need legislation that forces the Banks to lend money for Asset CREATION not Asset ACCUMULATION. Or at least TAX asset consumption heavily.

Building data centers is undoubtedly asset creation, though.

Re: Groq investor sounds alarm on data centers

#75

Post by michaelteter » Wed, Jan 07, 2026, 8:20 PM UTC

SR2Z wrote: post #74

tharmas wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If resources were more evenly distributed, we would see different regions and peoples doing more varied things which would be appropriate for their needs. You need legislation that forces the Banks to lend money for Asset CREATION not Asset ACCUMULATION. Or at least TAX asset consumption heavily.

Building data centers is undoubtedly asset creation, though.

But like many commercial activities, the full cost of the endeavor is not entirely met by those who will gain the most. In other words, the corps will get the benefit of lower energy costs by going into markets where their buying power will allow them to essentially slurp up the cheapest energy, pushing the rates up for the individual population (who will not gain financially from the new assets).

This is especially true for limited natural resources like water. And it's been true for oil and gas development for a century.