First Actual CPU Energy Use Statistics Published

BBCWatcher writes "CNN is reporting that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in August asked server manufacturers to develop 'miles per gallon' ratings for their equipment that would provide accurate assessments of energy efficiency. IBM says it is now providing 'typical usage ratings' for its line of z9 mainframe computers, in addition to previously available maximum power ratings. More than 1,000 z9s around the world started reporting (with the owners' permission) on May 11th their actual installed power and cooling demands, so IBM can publish statistics such as how much energy is required to turn on an additional processor to run multiple Linux virtual servers. The answer? About 20 total watts. 'Over time every vendor is going to be asked to provide typical energy use numbers for their equipment. It's what the EPA wants, and this allows us to move beyond simple performance benchmarking to energy benchmarking.'"

Comments

damn lies

[Bob-taro]

Oh, but there are so many ways to play with statistics. Hey, is the the first post?

Re:damn lies

[Bob-taro]

Ha! I confess, I cut that post short to try to get the first post (I'd never gotten one before!)

Anyway, the problem with trying to get some "miles per gallon" efficiency rating on computers is defining the "miles". For example, if computer A is 2 times faster and uses 1.5 times the energy compared to computer B at full load, and both computers are run at full load 8 hrs a day (doing some serious number crunching), which computer is more efficient? A is using more power, but is doing twice the amount of "work" of B. So do you measure straight Watts? Watts / MFLOPS? If you use MFLOPS, how do you account for differences in architecture?

Power consumption since mid-80's?

[securityfolk]

I would be interested in seeing statistics from the 80's on, to show how much power an "average" home PC or business workstation consumes. Over the years I've heard things like "it takes more energy to power it on than to just let it run", "it uses as much energy as a blowdryer", and "it uses as much energy as a lightbulb". Also, doesn't it take LOTS more energy to continually refresh RAM than it does to enable a processor? Think we could break usage down by component in these stats?

Cheers, Securityfolk

Nice to get a watt/CPU

[Lookin4Trouble]

How about getting a realistic number for BTUs of cooling per HDD/stick of RAM/Processor? my 31 year old Liebert is dying, and the time has come to go to in-row rack-standing AC, but I don't know whether to stick to 2x10Ton or if I need to go for a 3x10 (underfloor in a small datacenter - 30 racks, 250ish nodes). I realize manufacturers have whitepapers out on how much cooling is recommended, but those numbers lie like dogs. "Typical installation: 1 processor, 1 stick of ram, 1 HDD, 1 Power supply" - typical config for my cluster is 4 processors, 8 sticks of RAM, and 2 HDDs on dual power supplies... anyone know where I could get this type of info besides Gartner or the like subscription $ervice$ (yep, they get you coming AND going)

Re:Nice to get a watt/CPU

[An dochasac]

While it's a baby step in the right direction, Watts alone as a "benchmark" is meaningless as is Watts/CPU. The VIC-20 likely beat the Z9 back in 1980.

If IBM is serious about server energy consumption, they should publish statistics using the SWaP (Space Watts and Performance) benchmark Sun has been promoting for several years or even "MFLOPS/Watt" or "Page serves/second/Watt" If the Z9 can handle a typical highly threaded webserver load with fewer watts than something like Sun's T2000 Niagara while providing identical performance, IBM shouldn't be afraid to prove it.

Until then, I'll assume it's just another useless benchmark configured specifically to make IBM's products look better than its competitors.

Reason To Buy A CPU

[bostons1337]

Just curious what you guys think about how this relates to buying a CPU. Do you think individuals and companies are going to take a big look at the CPU Energy Use when deciding on buying CPUs? I personally don't think it will become a deciding factor, like processor speed or L1 and L2 cache size, but I think it definetly helps in making a decision.

How big a fraction?

[columbus]

This looks like a positive development.

It seems that the computer industry on the whole has become more concerned with energy efficiency over the last few years. I'm glad to see it. As a discipline, computer science is always looking for ways to eke out more efficiency, whether it is at the algorithmic level or at the level of chip manufacture. It seems to be a be a natural fit to extend this thinking further into energy consumption as well.

But I have to wonder, how much of a difference can we make? I think that the energy consumption involved in the field of computers - through the whole lifecycle: manufacture, operation & disposal - is relatively low compared to the energy consumed in other areas of the economy (transportation, heating, lighting, manufacture).

Would we be better off spending our time optimizing energy consumption in other industries?

Tax benefit

[slackoon]

The government gives tax benefits for driving hybrid vehicles and I believe they should do it for energy efficient computers as well. "According to the Computer Industry Almanac Web site, at the end of the year 2000, there were 168.84 million computers in use. The projection for the end of 2001 is 182.24 million." So just imagine how many there are now! With that many computers, many of which are never turned off, the energy savings could be enormous.

Re:about time.

[Rei]

I agree. For those with home servers like me who leave their computers on all the time, I'd be willing to pay an extra $5 or so per watt saved ($2 for the price extra watt over the course of an assumed usage lifespan of 3 years, $1 for the reduced cooling cost and increase in part lifespan from it being cooler, and $2 extra for the environmental benefit). If I lived in a place with expensive power, like California, that would probably be $7 or so per watt saved.