Saiweb » Green Giant

“Green Giant” the i-cluster?

Buzz — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 12:01:19 +0000

So the 3g iPhone is out, and a _lot_ of 1st gen iPhone people are looking to grab this new phone as a replacement due to the new features, 3g, gps etc …

That leaves a _LOT_ of 1st gen iPhones that potentially are going to end up on your local dump (landfill) …

Further to the “Green Giant” beowulf cluster project, with the 1st gen iPhone having been cracked open for homebrew multiple times (Hackaday search for Iphone), why not try to re-cycle the 1st gen iPhones into this project as cluster nodes?

I am now looking at places like freecycle to see if I can get hold of any 1st gen’s to do development on … time will tell

But one of the features I have planned should I be able to get hold of a 1st gen or two is using the accelerometer to control the nodes online / offline status …

Anyway all concept and dreams unless one appears.

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Green Giant – Hardware Estimates

Buzz — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 14:02:06 +0000

Ok so I have begun to work out the cost implications of doing this …

On the upshot the concept I have in mind will allow for nodes to be added dynamically.

Anyway onto the “beancounting”

GA-G33M-DSR2 £65.56 (ebuyer)
Corsair 4GB DDR2(800mhz) £65.35 x 2 (£130.7)
Intel core 2 quad Q6600 Energy Efficent 95w 2.4GZ 8mb L2 (4mb per core pair) £126.99

Total: £323.25

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Example config:

5 Nodes
20 Cpu cores
48 GHZ
40GB Ram
150 Gflops (estimated)

£1616.25 Total
£33.67 / Ghz
£10.78/Gflop/s

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Quite a considerable “chunk” of change, anyone any ideas as to cheaper suppliers? my Prices are based on the ebuyer.co.uk costs at the time of writing.

For US readers £1616.25 @ £1:$1.9432 = $3140.697 total = $628.14 / node

Update based on my previous spec here

“Not draw more than a total 30w / GHZ under load (Bringing the 4 node total to just 120w)”

Based on the current _estimated_ 400w @ 48GHZ = 8.33w / GHZ (Well under target) …

We shall see what the actuall power consumption is once I find an alternate supplier.
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Green Giant Concept change

Buzz — Mon, 26 May 2008 13:06:15 +0000

So while reading Hackaday today I came across a “render farm” project which has about the same power usage as a desktop (400w) the difference is this one has 24cpu’s and 48gb of ram.

“green giant” cluster project

Buzz — Wed, 14 May 2008 10:22:55 +0000

So I am still looking for a viable PICO itx motherboard supplier … but the concept is rolling along nicely, so here’s a little more information.

The “project” is to make a beowulf cluster but as efficent and therefor green as possible, current “Pico” itx power suppliers advertise a 96% efficency … not bad

So why the pico form factor?

The reason I am going for this form factor is due to it’s size and power draw, because of the lower power draw of this form factor it allow for other (greener) power options to be explored.

So what’s the spec?

The project must have the following:

Have at least 4ghz (4 nodes), distibuted processing power
Not draw more than a total 30w / GHZ under load (Bringing the 4 node total to just 120w)
Fit into a 2u rack chasis.

The lower the power consumption per GHZ the better, obviously, and if I can reduce the power consumption under load enough, this should allow for offsetting the running of the cluster using alternative energy sources.

Anway I have now created a category green giant and will continue to post more information as the concept progresses, I hope to get some technical diagrams up soon.