Microsoft Serves Cloud From the Sea Bed (datacenterdynamics.com)

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Microsoft Serves Cloud From the Sea Bed (datacenterdynamics.com)

Posted by timothy on Monday February 1, 2016 @02:35AM from the hard-to-tell-if-it's-raining-there dept.

judgecorp writes: A Microsoft Research project to run a data center underwater was so successful the team actually delivered commercial Azure cloud services from the module, which was 1km off the US Pacific coast for three months. The vessel, dubbed Leona Philpot after a Halo character, is a proof of concept for Project Natick, which proposes small data centers that could be submerged for five years or more, serving coastal communities.

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Sorry by Anonymous Coward · 2016-02-01 02:39 · Score: 4, Insightful

Sorry for hijacking this article, but I would like to say that since the latest takeover, we have seen much higher quality articles than we saw pre-takeover. The articles all appear to follow the "News for Nerds. News that matters." tagline that Slashdot used to follow. It is early, but I am cautiously optimistic that things are getting better.
Keep up the good work.
Open Waters.. by jellomizer · 2016-02-01 02:49 · Score: 4, Insightful

Maintenance must be a killer... Having to dive to fix a problem. I am not even making fun of Microsoft track record of less than stellar reliability to make 5 years of uptime seem possible.
But connections to the systems, Cable get corroded or broken.
Pirates you have millions of dollars of equipment under the sea mostly unguarded. If they may want to bring it up to steal and sell the hardware... Or they could hack into it the hard way (To get information from it)

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If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
1. Re:Open Waters.. by avandesande · 2016-02-01 02:55 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  It's full of spares and with current virtualization technology they will never need to do this. They have already been doing this 'pod' concept above ground for years.
  
  --
  love is just extroverted narcissism
2. Re:Open Waters.. by knightghost · 2016-02-01 02:58 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Modern data center modules no longer require physical maintenance. You load up on redundancy based on MTTF, turn it on, administer remotely, then replace the entire thing in 5 or so years. Redundancy and replacement is cheaper than maintenance.
3. Re:Open Waters.. by Anonymous Coward · 2016-02-01 03:08 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  That sounds like the current corporate mindset towards IT workers as well.
Re:Huh? by Anonymous Coward · 2016-02-01 03:13 · Score: 5, Funny

So their portable data center is about the size of a container. Why not put it on dry land? Certainly renting ground the size of a container from someone has to be cheaper than running undersea cables. This seems like a stunt, not a business plan.
But this is a sunk cost.
Re:Azure by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · 2016-02-01 03:17 · Score: 4, Funny

When the servers crash and display a blue screen it's not so evident anymore.
Re:Huh? by mrchaotica · 2016-02-01 03:19 · Score: 4, Informative

Cold ocean water transfers heat away from the container much more efficiently than warm air would. A cable might be more expensive than rent, but is it more expensive than rent + air conditioning?

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"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Re:Huh? by Kyont · 2016-02-01 05:56 · Score: 4, Funny

But this is a sunk cost.
Even so, on this whole investment, they must be... underwater.
The project is probably run by someone young, who is still... wet behind the ears.
Sorry. I'm just... fishing for karma. I'll say goodbye now... *waves*

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You shall see a cow on the roof of a cotton house.