Intel Embraces Oil Immersion Cooling For Servers

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Intel Embraces Oil Immersion Cooling For Servers

Posted by Soulskill on Tuesday September 4, 2012 @12:09PM from the pretty-slick dept.

1sockchuck writes "Intel has just concluded a year-long test in which it immersed servers in an oil bath, and has affirmed that the technology is highly efficient and safe for servers. The chipmaker is now working on reference designs, heat sinks and boards that are optimized for immersion cooling. 'We're evaluating how (immersion cooling) can change the way data centers are designed and operated,' said Mike Patterson, senior power and thermal architect at Intel. 'I think it will catch on. It's going to be a slow progression, but it will start in high-performance computing.' Intel's test used technology from Green Revolution Cooling, which says its design eliminates the need for raised flooring, CRAC units or chillers. Other players in immersion cooling include Iceotope and Hardcore (now LiquiCool)."

49 of 230 comments (clear)

Min score:

Reason:

Sort:

Wait, isn't oil flammable? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-04 12:14 · Score: 3, Funny

Is it really a good idea to put computers and hydrocarbons that closely together?
What if there's a fire?
1. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by ColdWetDog · 2012-09-04 12:16 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  Is it really a good idea to put computers and hydrocarbons that closely together?
  What if there's a fire?
  Most people would put it out. What, exactly, were you thinking?
  
  --
  Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
2. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by mirix · 2012-09-04 12:45 · Score: 2
  
  Mineral oil is combustible in the same way that wax, sugar, wood, etc, are. It burns, but it isn't flammable, as the flashpoint is way too high.
  You need to hold it at a high temperature to sustain combustion (like a wick, for example).
  
  --
  Sent from my PDP-11
3. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by gagol · 2012-09-04 13:12 · Score: 2
  
  The technique has been field tested in submarines for quite a long time.
  
  --
  Tomorrow is another day...
4. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by Bruce+Perens · 2012-09-04 13:18 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  This is a bit confused, I'm afraid. Diesel has a flash point of 100 to 200 Farenheit depending on the type of fuel, etc. If you get it that hot, or hotter, it can accumulate enough flammable vapor to burn.
  In a Diesel engine, compression heats it, and it ignites. But compression is not the only way to ignite it.
  
  --
  Bruce Perens.
5. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by bev_tech_rob · 2012-09-04 13:22 · Score: 2
  
  Yes...it will ignite very readily with a match. Have watched too many people burn brush piles with it when I was a kid. It doesn't flash up or the vapors don't ignite like gasoline, but burns steadily.
  
  --
  You're messin' with my Zen Thing, man.....
6. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by gweihir · 2012-09-04 13:27 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Yes. I remember on of the main threats to submarines being fires....
  
  --
  Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
7. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by arth1 · 2012-09-04 13:55 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  In general, you need a wick. Diesel won't burn by itself, unless the temperature is very high or the air superoxygenated.
  The same is true for gasoline, by the way. I used to fill a bottle cap with gasoline, and stub out my cigarette in it. It never caught on fire. The "no smoking" rule of gas stations is mostly because of people using open flames to light their cigarettes and pipes in a fume filled environment, and not so much a cigarette that isn't hotter than many exhaust pipes.
8. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by arth1 · 2012-09-04 14:06 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  This is a bit confused, I'm afraid. Diesel has a flash point of 100 to 200 Farenheit depending on the type of fuel, etc. If you get it that hot, or hotter, it can accumulate enough flammable vapor to burn.
  You need a certain ratio of vapour to air, and you still need something to ignite that vapour mix.
  
  In a Diesel engine, compression heats it, and it ignites. But compression is not the only way to ignite it.
  
  This is misleading at best, reading like you compress the diesel. You don't - liquids don't compress.
  You compress air, which heats to a heck of a lot more than 200F (more like 1000F), and also puts more oxygen per volume in the chamber. The high temperature of the air combined with the high O2 level allows the combustion to take place.
9. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by nitehawk214 · 2012-09-04 14:38 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Yes. I remember on of the main threats to submarines being fires....
  Wait, were you being sarcastic? The number one main most dangerous thing about being on a submarine is a fire breaking out.
  
  --
  I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
10. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by the_rajah · 2012-09-04 14:44 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  I work in the elevator business as an Engineer. One day I was working on software in a new installation when the service man with me got a call to service an elevator in a mansion nearby. He suggested I come with him as it was an interesting installation. It was indeed. This was a three stop elevator installed in 1917 and all original and working just like it did almost 100 years ago. The controller resembled a cast iron bathtub with a lid having the relays mounted suspended from it. When the lid was lowered the relays were suspended in oil. I've seen some very old elevators still in use, but never one like that.
  
  --
  
  "Do the Right Thing. It will gratify some people and astound the rest." - Mark Twain
11. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by fustakrakich · 2012-09-04 15:28 · Score: 2
  
  Most people would put it out. What, exactly, were you thinking?
  Maybe tossing a bag of fries into the hot oil?
  
  --
  “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
12. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by Mashiki · 2012-09-04 16:22 · Score: 2
  
  Not really surprised. I worked in heavy industry back in the early 2000's, and we'd immerse our relays and some of our transformer blocks in oil to keep them cool, especially if they were going to very hot parts of the world. In some cases we'd fully skip the electronics, and go right to plain relays for the setups if they were going anywhere where: Power/voltage issues were going to be a problem. Or where brownouts/spikes were going to be a problem. Or where contamination would be a serious issue.
  The main reason was, in the customers case it was easier to either get the parts, or to manufacture a replacement on site than it was to try getting a hold of an electronic replacement. Especially if a PLC would be held up in customs for 3 weeks.
  
  --
  Om, nomnomnom...
13. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by tsotha · 2012-09-04 16:32 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  And yet if you drop a match in a coffee can full of diesel it will gutter out without lighting the fuel.
14. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by Bruce+Perens · 2012-09-04 16:48 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  About 30 years ago, I saw a fireman demonstrate that he could thrust a burning blowtorch flame into gasoline quickly, and it would gutter out without setting it aflame.
  The liquid part isn't what does the burning. It's the vapor.
  
  --
  Bruce Perens.
15. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by subreality · 2012-09-04 19:34 · Score: 2
  
  A word of warning: the oil in the tub was almost certainly a full load of pure PCBs. They were ideal for the purpose: highly dielectric, nonflammable, stable. They're great so long as you look past the fact that they're horribly toxic and carcinogenic, so they were very widely used in exactly that kind of application. Be careful if you ever have to crack one open again.
16. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by smash · 2012-09-04 20:01 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Plenty of motorcycle engines are also air/oil cooled. The concorde even used JET FUEL for cooling.
  Without exposure to air (to enable combustion to happen), and a temp approaching the flashpoint of the fuel, there's no fire risk.
  
  --
  I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
17. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by necro81 · 2012-09-04 23:55 · Score: 2
  
  I used to fill a bottle cap with gasoline, and stub out my cigarette in it
  Were you all out of water?
18. Re:Wait, isn't oil flammable? by GungaDan · 2012-09-05 03:17 · Score: 2
  
  "Fluids typically do a much better job of transferring and holding heat."
  The pedant in me wishes to point out that air is also a fluid.
  
  --
  Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
Not all oils are flammable by Taco+Cowboy · 2012-09-04 12:16 · Score: 4, Informative

One example of non-flammable oil is Silicone Oil
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicone_oil

--
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
1. Re:Not all oils are flammable by cheese_boy · 2012-09-04 12:24 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  One example of non-flammable oil is Silicone Oil
  You don't even have to go non-flammable - large transformers that you might see next to buildings have been using oil as a coolant and insulation for decades.
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transformer_oil
2. Re:Not all oils are flammable by demonlapin · 2012-09-04 13:21 · Score: 2
  
  One blew directly over my head - I was perhaps three feet from the pole - when I was a kid. Big blue flash of light(ning), huge explosion, smoke rising... it was awesome.
3. Re:Not all oils are flammable by postbigbang · 2012-09-04 13:40 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  And now you have eleven posters of Tesla in your office?
  
  --
  ---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
4. Re:Not all oils are flammable by demonlapin · 2012-09-04 14:15 · Score: 2
  
  Nah, I'm not the Oatmeal guy.
Not only safe... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-04 12:25 · Score: 5, Funny

...but if you put the server room near the cafeteria, you can make fries too.
1. Re:Not only safe... by guruevi · 2012-09-04 12:47 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  I think chunks of fries and burgers (and cell phones and other crap that gets dropped into the oil in restaurants) may cause certain issues with the flow of the heat.
  
  --
  Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
2. Re:Not only safe... by mirix · 2012-09-04 12:56 · Score: 2
  
  Mineral oil is generally used as a laxative, so unless they are cooling with vegetable oil, I'd advise against this. :-p
  
  --
  Sent from my PDP-11
What "News"! by Ashenkase · 2012-09-04 12:26 · Score: 2

Everything old is new again.
What about the weight? by sub67 · 2012-09-04 12:31 · Score: 3, Insightful

Seems to me this would add a considerable load to whatever flooring is in place.
Re:It's great until... by pla · 2012-09-04 12:37 · Score: 2

Oil works great until you have to remove something...

You realize, of course, that datacenters don't "remove" anything smaller than an entire blade (or depending on the scale involved, they pull an entire rack). Then they rotate a spare into place, ship the bad one out the door, and let the vendor screw around with figuring out "why" it failed.

Intel doesn't mean for your average Mom n' Pop running Windows SBS in a half-rack mounted PowerEdge to use immersion cooling.
They used to say ... by PPH · 2012-09-04 12:40 · Score: 5, Funny

... that the British don't build computers because they couldn't figure out how to get them to leak oil.
I welcome our new UK computing overlords.

--
Have gnu, will travel.
2000 do-it-yourself by jcohen · 2012-09-04 13:00 · Score: 3, Interesting

June 30, 2000: Slashdot reports that some overclockers have solved their cooling problem by immersing their motherboard in Fluorinert. Crazy kids. Who knew it would eventually catch on?

--
"Imaginary solutions to real problems."
Re:Liquid Metal CPU cooler by scheme · 2012-09-04 13:08 · Score: 4, Informative

The cooler uses a NaK alloy. Check youtube and you'll see that this reacts violently with water and will ignite in air. The company claims that they wouldn't worry about leaks in the cooler but I wouldn't trust them or want that stuff near my expensive hardware. The craziness of using NaK alloy as a coolant for a computer is probably why the company closed it's doors.

--
"When you sit with a nice girl for two hours, it seems like two minutes. When you sit on a hot stove for two minutes, it
Re:It's great until... by scheme · 2012-09-04 13:11 · Score: 4, Insightful

Oil works great until you have to remove something... You realize, of course, that datacenters don't "remove" anything smaller than an entire blade (or depending on the scale involved, they pull an entire rack). Then they rotate a spare into place, ship the bad one out the door, and let the vendor screw around with figuring out "why" it failed.
I doubt most datacenters swap out racks. Unless they've built a crane into the datacenter, you'd need to get a forklift to move the entire rack and there isn't clearance for that. Swapping blades is entirely reasonable, swapping 1U servers less so unless you have some really smart automation and failover to reimage the server and get it back to the previous state.

--
"When you sit with a nice girl for two hours, it seems like two minutes. When you sit on a hot stove for two minutes, it
Re:that;s why I use carbohydrates by kelemvor4 · 2012-09-04 13:13 · Score: 2, Funny

Are you suggesting someone waste beer on cooling a server? You should be in prison.
Re:Cray did this decades ago by Trepidity · 2012-09-04 13:20 · Score: 4, Informative

Not to mention Slashdot's own coverage (possibly incomplete):
2003, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2010, 2011

--
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Perfect by SuperKendall · 2012-09-04 13:21 · Score: 4, Funny

Have you ever worked at a company where middle management could not have used daily bunches of fries with extra laxatives?

--
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Re:that;s why I use carbohydrates by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-04 13:22 · Score: 5, Funny

No, he's suggesting beer should be earmarked as 'high performance server coolant', the keg as a 'coolant storage reservoir' and the tap as a 'used coolant bleedoff valve', the latter to be placed in the bofh's office next to the coffee machine.
Pff, that's so 2006. by conspirator23 · 2012-09-04 13:30 · Score: 2

The first place I ran across the concept was Tom's Hardware, and you can still see the original article. "High Performance Computing" says Intel? Pish Tosh. Kids, you really can try this at home... but get a grown-up to assist you!
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/strip-fans,1203.html
Let's party like it's 1999 by Microlith · 2012-09-04 13:33 · Score: 2

http://web.archive.org/web/19991006062047/http://www.accsdata.com/drffreeze/TestBox2.htm
Sadly, all the pictures appear to have been lost.
I remember this guy going through and dunking his systems in Mineral oil over a decade ago, back when I was in 11th grade. You know, back with the BP6 was amazing shit and slotkets were an essential overclocker's tool.
Raised Flooring by MDMurphy · 2012-09-04 14:29 · Score: 2

I spent most of the 80's working on flight simulators that had rows of cabinets on raised flooring. One sim was supposed to be at 70F and the temp was usually so stable that if it was up more than a few degrees we could tell by feel and smell as soon as we walked in the room.
By shear luck I worked on simulators in Las Vegas, New Mexico and South Korea, all places that in the summer you really wouldn't want to be working outside. The constant temp during working hours was great ( though I think it made me more of a wimp for temp extremes when I went outside ) Thinking about the oil immersion and what I'd guess would be warmer ambient temps in computer rooms is a little sad. It was the extra cool computer rooms that I worked in that added to the appeal of my job back then.
1998 by slackware+3.6 · 2012-09-04 14:40 · Score: 3, Interesting

And I was using a mineral oil bath (bar frige guts were used to keep the oil cool) to cool my over clocked Pentium. HDD, optical drives and power supply sat on a grate at the top of the coleman cooler and every thing else was submerged. I even did it with distilled water for a bit but it was to hard to keep the water clean.
Re:that;s why I use carbohydrates by fustakrakich · 2012-09-04 15:33 · Score: 3, Insightful

Don't worry. It's Coors... Not really suitable for human consumption.

--
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Re:Hardware failure by afidel · 2012-09-04 17:23 · Score: 2

Ram dies all the time, it's my second highest AFR part after hdd's and ahead of both fans and psu's which are the only other components with a statistically significant failure rate.

--
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Re:Liquid Metal CPU cooler by serviscope_minor · 2012-09-04 19:49 · Score: 4, Insightful

I wouldn't trust them or want that stuff near my expensive hardware.
Wow, you care WAAAAY too much about your hardware.
I wouldn't tust them or want that stuff near ME.
Screw the computer.

--
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Re:Liquid Metal CPU cooler by ldobehardcore · 2012-09-04 19:58 · Score: 2

To ensure cetacean transparency? XD

--
Hectice, baby, Mercator says hello to you
Re:that;s why I use carbohydrates by oPless · 2012-09-04 21:13 · Score: 4, Insightful

Don't worry. It's Budweiser ... Not really suitable for human consumption.
FTFY
Re:that;s why I use carbohydrates by RaceProUK · 2012-09-04 23:23 · Score: 2

Don't worry. It's Fosters... Not really suitable for human consumption.
FTFY
AFTFY

--
No colour or religion ever stopped the bullet from a gun
Re:Cray did this decades ago by Compaqt · 2012-09-05 01:02 · Score: 3, Funny

These low UID users are so old, they've been replaced by Beowulf clusters of nanobots that remember every single Slashdot post ever.

--
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog