Did you measure power factor on all servers? How many is "several" white-box servers? The main power draw in most servers is the processor. I'd bet that "several" means 3-5 single processor servers. And the Dells are probably dual-quad processor.
Dell servers load balance incoming power over both PSUs, which is why power consumption spikes when you pull the power on one.
Did you measure power factor on your white-box servers? If they don't have power factor correction (preferably active PFC), they likely show up as 50-100% more load to the UPS they are on and power consumption goes up accordingly even though they are only actually using less power. Active PFC (standard on all Dell servers, unfortunately not on any desktop I've seen) is extremely important to have in PSUs for the datacenter.
Climatologists explained why we didn't get more hurricanes than usual in 2006. A quick google search for "2006 hurricanes global warming" quickly presents several reasons:
1. 2006 Ocean surface temps in the North Atlantic have cooled down, while the media in 2005 led people to believe that 2006 would be more of the same. I could not find any concrete evidence that in general scientists agreed that 2006 would be a record hurricane year. 2. The link between global warming and large tropical storms seems to be under some debate.
Please provide a source for your theory that global temps have not risen since 1999. All the plots I have seen show 1999 as an abnormally hot year, again showing how some would like to pick one single data point to support their views. The same people would like to use the current record snow fall in NY or the record cold in CA earlier this year as proof that the earth isn't warming.
If you follow the trend from the past 50 years (or longer) it is quite clear that global temperatures are rising.
Enthusiasm for the global-warming scare also ensures that heatwaves make headlines, while contrary symptoms, such as this winter's billion-dollar loss of Californian crops to unusual frost, are relegated to the business pages.
I stopped taking the author seriously after I read this line. The author obviously doesn't understand global warming, either and is using examples out of context to support his theory.
Global warming will cause an overall warming effect across the entire planet. Over the entire planet, some areas of the earth will cool significantly, some will not change at all, and others will get warmer. Weather in general will get more extreme - This means more drought, more heatwaves and yes, more freezes and freak blizzards.
While sea-ice has diminished in the Arctic since 1978, it has grown by 8% in the Southern Ocean.
Nice, so give a hard number for how much ice has increased in the souther ocean, but decline to state by what percentage sea ice has declined in the Arctic. I suspect that Arctic ice has decreased by significantly more than 8%. I'm also sure that the collapse of that huge ice shelf in the Antarctic may have had something to do with the increase in sea ice in the southern oceans.
Many people out there have "SUV syndrome" when buying a PSU and incorrectly assume that they need that huge 500w (or bigger) PSU for their PC. Unless you really do have a high-end gaming PC with a high-end graphics card and multiple hard drives, your computer will almost certainly normally use less than 200w peak, and more typically 75-150w.
What does happen with an oversized PSU is in order to build a PSU to handle high current, it's efficiency at low current drops significantly. Typically the efficiency of a PSU starts dropping pretty quickly below 50% capacity and even faster below 25% capacity.
Finally, you can also look for PSUs which are 80 PLUS certified. These PSUs have been independently tested to be at least 80% efficient at 20%, 50% and 100% loads with a power factor rating of at least 0.9 at those load points.
The Antec EA430 is part of Antec's EarthWatts series of PSUs which are all 80 PLUS certified.
Out of the other PSUs casualsax3 tested, the SilverStone SST-ST50EF is also 80 PLUS certified. I could not verify if the Seasonic S12-380 is 80 PLUS certified, but it does not appear to be so even though it is more efficient than the Silverstone in casualsax3's test. If the S12-380 is of the "S12 Energy Plus" series then it should also be 80% efficient. I wonder if Seasonic quietly started shipping Energy Plus S12s instead of the old ones...
Nice data. I'm surprised to see the Antec PSU more efficient than the Seasonic as Seasonic is generally regarded as one of if not the most efficient PSU manufactures. In fact, Seasonic manufactures many PSUs for other companies, Antec included so I would not be surprised if the Antec PSU you tested was in fact a rebadged Seasonic unit.
In general, any PSU with active PFC will generally pretty efficient, especially compared to any PSU without active PFC. An easy way to tell if a PSU has active PFC is to see if it can take 100-240v AC without a switch.
The file corruption talked about has been in the kernel for some time, but recent changes made it more visible and easier to trigger. It should be fixed in the latest 2.6.20rc kernel.
If you search the kernel archives for ext3 corruption you'll find a couple long threads discussing the issue and the solution.
Do you know of any video player that will be capable of taking advantage of two processors? On the mythtv mailing lists, a number of people have reported better performance (smoother playback, fewer hiccups) when playing HD content when using a dual-core processor. Now, this isn't because the player itself can take advantage of multiple CPUs, but because the player uses a good amount of CPU and so does X. Having two cores lets you dedicate a processor to both processes giving you more headroom.
Having another core is especially important if it's mixed frontend/backend system where the backend may be recording other shows or doing commercial flagging or downloading program schedules or whatever else it may need to do.
So just because the player can't utilize multiple processors doesn't mean that the system won't benefit from having them.
You are, I hope, aware that modern ABS systems typically give a shorter stopping distance than even a talented driver, on any surface other than dry tarmac? Sorry, Sir, you are incorrect. On dry tarmac, modern ABS will stop faster than a talented driver except under special circumstances. Depending on the circumstances, even the most ham fisted driver can out brake modern ABS.
ABS's primary goal is to keep the tire turning so that you can maintain steering control of the car. A locked tire does not allow you to make steering input, not to mention that a locked tire's coefficient of friction goes down dramatically compared to one that is turning close to the speed that the vehicle is traveling.
Maximum braking force between the tire and ground (on a surface that is not "loose" like snow or gravel) occurs when the tire is spinning approximately 5-20% slower than you are moving. The optimal amount of slip that produces maximum braking force varies depending on both the tire and road surface.
On a "loose" surface such as snow or gravel, maximum braking force (and shortest stopping distance) occurs when you lock up the tires. This is because on a loose surface a wedge of whatever is loose builds up in front of the tires providing additional friction. Without that wedge stopping distances go up significantly and it is not uncommon to have a car require 50% longer or more to stop on a gravel surface with ABS engaged than with the wheels locked. Of course, you do give up most steering control with the wheels locked.
I have to admit that while I especially didn't like Bob Roll at first, he's grown on me. He sure is goofy and fun to make fun of. "Tour Day FrAnce!" LOL! He absolutely butchers it every time!
That said, Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwin are definitely great commentators and I wouldn't want anyone else commenting during the sages.
You mention pre-ignition, while your parent mentions detonation, and it's important to note that while many people use the 2 terms interchangably, technically they mean 2 different types of undesired combustion. I guess I could say: "How the fuck did the parent get modded informative?" too.:P
Pre-ignition is usually caused by localized hot-spots in the combustion chamber which cause the air/fuel mixture to light off well before the normal spark would light off the mixture. This means that the combustion event really gets going when the piston is still moving up instead of having started moving down, this really increases cylinder pressure and temps and the end result is typically a hole in the piston as it melts under the extreme conditions. Low octane fuel does not typically cause pre-ignition.
Detonation occurs well after the air/fuel mixture was lit by the spark plug. It is caused by unburned pockets of the air/fuel mixture spontaneously combusting due to heat and pressure. High octane fuel resists this spontaneous combustion better than low octane fuel. When detonation occurs, you get mini-explosions in the combustion chamber which spikes cylinder temperatures and pressures. If the detonations occurs under light load, nothing bad usually happens, as most engines will tolerate light detonation for quite a long time as the spike in pressure from detonation under light load can be absorbed by the engine. However, detonation under heavy load can quickly cause broken ring lands or damaged engine bearings.
Further complicating the matter, prolonged detonation often leads to pre-ignition, as the detonation raises cylinder temps causing a localized hot-spot which in turn can cause pre-ignition.
The system you just mentioned (Athlon 64 ~3000+, Nvidia 6600GT and assuming a 7200rpm drive, etc) shouldn't top out at more than 250watts at peak load being generous. If the Antec 350 PSU was causing your computer to randomly crash, chances are it was a crap PSU.
My desktop at work is an Athlon 64 3700+ (130nm, 2.4Ghz at 1.5v, 1MB L2 cache), 3 video cards (GeForce FX5500, and 2 GeForce2 MX 440s) and a standard 7200rpm IDE drive and a 250w PSU. It runs fine! Idle power is about 60watts with Cool'n'Quiet enabled and idle, 115w without Cool'n'Quiet enabled and idle, and 170w when giving everything a workout. It never crashes.
BTW, some actual idle power numbers from 3 PCs in my house measured using a Kill-A-Watt (and what I'm looking to do to reduce that power utilization):
1. K62 450 firewall/backup server - 35w idle Not much I can do here to reduce power utilization, at best I could replace it with something that might only draw 25w at idle. I should be able to replace it's firewall capabilities with my WRT54G by reflashing it and then move the backup server capabilities to the MythTV system (since it already has a big disk) and completely eliminate this system.
2. Duron 800 MythTV system - 90w idle Any AMD Cool'n'Quiet CPU should be able to get this to below 40w at idle, Cool'N'Quiet basically gets CPU power draw down a handful of watts at the low speed setting. Need to figure out how to let the system sleep/standby when no-one is using it and when no recordings are scheduled, and how to get it to wakeup when a recording is scheduled.
3. Athlon 1700+ Desktop - 90w idle Same CPU upgrade as #2. Need to adjust power settings to go into standby more readily where power should drop to a handful of watts.
My last month's power bill was 515kWh for $85 which is about 16c/kWh. If I can meet my power reduction goals for systems #2 and #3 that will save at least 50W of constant power each which is 36kWh/mo or about $6.
Granted it will cost $110-$160 to upgrade with either a Sempron 64 or an Athlon 64 system which puts the dollar break even point between 20-28 months, but the benefit to the environment offsets that.
Next, time to figure out where that other 300kWh/mo is coming from.
The primary problem with high power PSUs is that efficiency drops off significantly with low power draw.
For example a good 300w PSU w/a 100w load may be 80% efficient, but the same PSU w/a 40w load may only be 60% efficient. So that means that your typical PC drawing 100w from the PSU will be actually use a good amount less power with an appropriately sized PSU rather than that 600w bohemeth.
Hardly any PCs draw more than 300w at full load, so take into consideration the actual power draw before buying that high power PSU. A 400w PSU will supply more than enough power to any PC and make sure you get a high efficiency unit (Seasonic makes some good ones!).
You admit yourself that the old system was broken by saying that 2.4 took a huge dive in quality. 2.6 was also "flavorful" when it was first released. What you want is a totally new system where all bugs get fixed and nothing gets added until it's been proven that it doesn't break anything.
We already have that! You want ultra-stable? Stick with a 2.4 kernel.
You want a stable 2.6 kernel? Pay someone to maintain it for you. RedHat does a good job with RHEL.
That doesn't work for you either? Then go back to Windows.
I don't use Linus' tree anymore, and haven't for a couple years. This in and of itself annoys me; there's no more One True Linux that everyone can write to.
Various distro kernels do not vary that much in terms of functionality. I don't know why you seem to think they do.
Windows is _a lot_ more stable than 2.6 is, these days.
I haven't had any reliability problems on the dozens of machines I administer running 2.6 kernels, certainly not any more than I've had issues with Windows machines.
All I see is FUD and broad handwaving in your post. How about some hard facts?
But there is a problem; if you report a bug in a Redhat/SuSE kernel on the lk.ml you get a 'that's Redhat/SuSE problem - speak to them'.
I'm not sure why you think developers on LKML want to fix problems with RedHat/SuSE/IntertFavoriteDistroHere kernels running who knows what patches on top of them.
If you wrote some software and RedHat/SuSE/IntertFavoriteDistroHere repackaged it after applying some number of patches and then an end user came to you asking for help, would you really feel obligated to help them fix their problem if you already have more than enough on your plate as it is?
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Did you measure power factor on all servers? How many is "several" white-box servers? The main power draw in most servers is the processor. I'd bet that "several" means 3-5 single processor servers. And the Dells are probably dual-quad processor.
Dell servers load balance incoming power over both PSUs, which is why power consumption spikes when you pull the power on one.
Did you measure power factor on your white-box servers? If they don't have power factor correction (preferably active PFC), they likely show up as 50-100% more load to the UPS they are on and power consumption goes up accordingly even though they are only actually using less power. Active PFC (standard on all Dell servers, unfortunately not on any desktop I've seen) is extremely important to have in PSUs for the datacenter.
Climatologists explained why we didn't get more hurricanes than usual in 2006. A quick google search for "2006 hurricanes global warming" quickly presents several reasons:
1. 2006 Ocean surface temps in the North Atlantic have cooled down, while the media in 2005 led people to believe that 2006 would be more of the same. I could not find any concrete evidence that in general scientists agreed that 2006 would be a record hurricane year.
2. The link between global warming and large tropical storms seems to be under some debate.
Please provide a source for your theory that global temps have not risen since 1999. All the plots I have seen show 1999 as an abnormally hot year, again showing how some would like to pick one single data point to support their views. The same people would like to use the current record snow fall in NY or the record cold in CA earlier this year as proof that the earth isn't warming.
If you follow the trend from the past 50 years (or longer) it is quite clear that global temperatures are rising.
I stopped taking the author seriously after I read this line. The author obviously doesn't understand global warming, either and is using examples out of context to support his theory.
Global warming will cause an overall warming effect across the entire planet. Over the entire planet, some areas of the earth will cool significantly, some will not change at all, and others will get warmer. Weather in general will get more extreme - This means more drought, more heatwaves and yes, more freezes and freak blizzards.
Nice, so give a hard number for how much ice has increased in the souther ocean, but decline to state by what percentage sea ice has declined in the Arctic. I suspect that Arctic ice has decreased by significantly more than 8%. I'm also sure that the collapse of that huge ice shelf in the Antarctic may have had something to do with the increase in sea ice in the southern oceans.
Good question. I'm going to send NewEgg an email about it hopefully it's something they can add to their site.
One other guideline when purchasing a PSU:
Buy the smallest PSU possible!
Many people out there have "SUV syndrome" when buying a PSU and incorrectly assume that they need that huge 500w (or bigger) PSU for their PC. Unless you really do have a high-end gaming PC with a high-end graphics card and multiple hard drives, your computer will almost certainly normally use less than 200w peak, and more typically 75-150w.
What does happen with an oversized PSU is in order to build a PSU to handle high current, it's efficiency at low current drops significantly. Typically the efficiency of a PSU starts dropping pretty quickly below 50% capacity and even faster below 25% capacity.
Finally, you can also look for PSUs which are 80 PLUS certified. These PSUs have been independently tested to be at least 80% efficient at 20%, 50% and 100% loads with a power factor rating of at least 0.9 at those load points.
The Antec EA430 is part of Antec's EarthWatts series of PSUs which are all 80 PLUS certified.
Out of the other PSUs casualsax3 tested, the SilverStone SST-ST50EF is also 80 PLUS certified. I could not verify if the Seasonic S12-380 is 80 PLUS certified, but it does not appear to be so even though it is more efficient than the Silverstone in casualsax3's test. If the S12-380 is of the "S12 Energy Plus" series then it should also be 80% efficient. I wonder if Seasonic quietly started shipping Energy Plus S12s instead of the old ones...
Nice data. I'm surprised to see the Antec PSU more efficient than the Seasonic as Seasonic is generally regarded as one of if not the most efficient PSU manufactures. In fact, Seasonic manufactures many PSUs for other companies, Antec included so I would not be surprised if the Antec PSU you tested was in fact a rebadged Seasonic unit.
There is a full review of the PSU at SilentPCReview who has many full reviews of PSUs including efficiency tests.
In general, any PSU with active PFC will generally pretty efficient, especially compared to any PSU without active PFC. An easy way to tell if a PSU has active PFC is to see if it can take 100-240v AC without a switch.
BTW, the ext3 file corruption has also been fixed in 2.6.19.2.
The file corruption talked about has been in the kernel for some time, but recent changes made it more visible and easier to trigger. It should be fixed in the latest 2.6.20rc kernel.
If you search the kernel archives for ext3 corruption you'll find a couple long threads discussing the issue and the solution.
Having another core is especially important if it's mixed frontend/backend system where the backend may be recording other shows or doing commercial flagging or downloading program schedules or whatever else it may need to do.
So just because the player can't utilize multiple processors doesn't mean that the system won't benefit from having them.
bl.spamcop.net
list.dsbl.org I use those same domains for my mail servers and also find them to be very effective.
Besides spamcop.net, are there any other useful service to forward spam to to help add to these blacklists?
ABS's primary goal is to keep the tire turning so that you can maintain steering control of the car. A locked tire does not allow you to make steering input, not to mention that a locked tire's coefficient of friction goes down dramatically compared to one that is turning close to the speed that the vehicle is traveling.
Maximum braking force between the tire and ground (on a surface that is not "loose" like snow or gravel) occurs when the tire is spinning approximately 5-20% slower than you are moving. The optimal amount of slip that produces maximum braking force varies depending on both the tire and road surface.
On a "loose" surface such as snow or gravel, maximum braking force (and shortest stopping distance) occurs when you lock up the tires. This is because on a loose surface a wedge of whatever is loose builds up in front of the tires providing additional friction. Without that wedge stopping distances go up significantly and it is not uncommon to have a car require 50% longer or more to stop on a gravel surface with ABS engaged than with the wheels locked. Of course, you do give up most steering control with the wheels locked.
You can still use your credit card to fund an account to wager on horse racing online.
Yep. Even after combining your typical 12V brick combined with the PicoPSU is still more efficient than your typical PSU on the market today.
I imagine that there are a lot of ways you could make a pure AC to 12V DC adapter more efficient than your typicall 12V brick as Google suggests.
No, it wont. It will only be available in 45 states, the ones that don't use California ARB standards.
http://www.google.com/search?q=Mercedes+bluetec+c
I have to admit that while I especially didn't like Bob Roll at first, he's grown on me. He sure is goofy and fun to make fun of. "Tour Day FrAnce!" LOL! He absolutely butchers it every time!
That said, Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwin are definitely great commentators and I wouldn't want anyone else commenting during the sages.
How did Intel manage to stay in business the past couple years by selling more expensive, slower, hotter, power hungry CPUs?
You mention pre-ignition, while your parent mentions detonation, and it's important to note that while many people use the 2 terms interchangably, technically they mean 2 different types of undesired combustion. I guess I could say: "How the fuck did the parent get modded informative?" too. :P
Pre-ignition is usually caused by localized hot-spots in the combustion chamber which cause the air/fuel mixture to light off well before the normal spark would light off the mixture. This means that the combustion event really gets going when the piston is still moving up instead of having started moving down, this really increases cylinder pressure and temps and the end result is typically a hole in the piston as it melts under the extreme conditions. Low octane fuel does not typically cause pre-ignition.
Detonation occurs well after the air/fuel mixture was lit by the spark plug. It is caused by unburned pockets of the air/fuel mixture spontaneously combusting due to heat and pressure. High octane fuel resists this spontaneous combustion better than low octane fuel. When detonation occurs, you get mini-explosions in the combustion chamber which spikes cylinder temperatures and pressures. If the detonations occurs under light load, nothing bad usually happens, as most engines will tolerate light detonation for quite a long time as the spike in pressure from detonation under light load can be absorbed by the engine. However, detonation under heavy load can quickly cause broken ring lands or damaged engine bearings.
Further complicating the matter, prolonged detonation often leads to pre-ignition, as the detonation raises cylinder temps causing a localized hot-spot which in turn can cause pre-ignition.
Did you actually measure your power consumption?
The system you just mentioned (Athlon 64 ~3000+, Nvidia 6600GT and assuming a 7200rpm drive, etc) shouldn't top out at more than 250watts at peak load being generous. If the Antec 350 PSU was causing your computer to randomly crash, chances are it was a crap PSU.
My desktop at work is an Athlon 64 3700+ (130nm, 2.4Ghz at 1.5v, 1MB L2 cache), 3 video cards (GeForce FX5500, and 2 GeForce2 MX 440s) and a standard 7200rpm IDE drive and a 250w PSU. It runs fine! Idle power is about 60watts with Cool'n'Quiet enabled and idle, 115w without Cool'n'Quiet enabled and idle, and 170w when giving everything a workout. It never crashes.
BTW, some actual idle power numbers from 3 PCs in my house measured using a Kill-A-Watt (and what I'm looking to do to reduce that power utilization):
1. K62 450 firewall/backup server - 35w idle
Not much I can do here to reduce power utilization, at best I could replace it with something that might only draw 25w at idle. I should be able to replace it's firewall capabilities with my WRT54G by reflashing it and then move the backup server capabilities to the MythTV system (since it already has a big disk) and completely eliminate this system.
2. Duron 800 MythTV system - 90w idle
Any AMD Cool'n'Quiet CPU should be able to get this to below 40w at idle, Cool'N'Quiet basically gets CPU power draw down a handful of watts at the low speed setting. Need to figure out how to let the system sleep/standby when no-one is using it and when no recordings are scheduled, and how to get it to wakeup when a recording is scheduled.
3. Athlon 1700+ Desktop - 90w idle
Same CPU upgrade as #2. Need to adjust power settings to go into standby more readily where power should drop to a handful of watts.
My last month's power bill was 515kWh for $85 which is about 16c/kWh. If I can meet my power reduction goals for systems #2 and #3 that will save at least 50W of constant power each which is 36kWh/mo or about $6.
Granted it will cost $110-$160 to upgrade with either a Sempron 64 or an Athlon 64 system which puts the dollar break even point between 20-28 months, but the benefit to the environment offsets that.
Next, time to figure out where that other 300kWh/mo is coming from.
The primary problem with high power PSUs is that efficiency drops off significantly with low power draw.
For example a good 300w PSU w/a 100w load may be 80% efficient, but the same PSU w/a 40w load may only be 60% efficient. So that means that your typical PC drawing 100w from the PSU will be actually use a good amount less power with an appropriately sized PSU rather than that 600w bohemeth.
Hardly any PCs draw more than 300w at full load, so take into consideration the actual power draw before buying that high power PSU. A 400w PSU will supply more than enough power to any PC and make sure you get a high efficiency unit (Seasonic makes some good ones!).
My guess would be safety. I wouldn't want to crash going very fast in those things.
Go BACK TO THE OLD SYSTEM.
You admit yourself that the old system was broken by saying that 2.4 took a huge dive in quality. 2.6 was also "flavorful" when it was first released. What you want is a totally new system where all bugs get fixed and nothing gets added until it's been proven that it doesn't break anything.
We already have that! You want ultra-stable? Stick with a 2.4 kernel.
You want a stable 2.6 kernel? Pay someone to maintain it for you. RedHat does a good job with RHEL.
That doesn't work for you either? Then go back to Windows.
I don't use Linus' tree anymore, and haven't for a couple years. This in and of itself annoys me; there's no more One True Linux that everyone can write to.
Various distro kernels do not vary that much in terms of functionality. I don't know why you seem to think they do.
Windows is _a lot_ more stable than 2.6 is, these days.
I haven't had any reliability problems on the dozens of machines I administer running 2.6 kernels, certainly not any more than I've had issues with Windows machines.
All I see is FUD and broad handwaving in your post. How about some hard facts?
No one is shoving anything down your throat. If you don't like the way Linus' 2.6 kernel is developed, feel free to do one of the following:
Use something else that suits your needs better. Sounds like the old 2.4 kernels worked suited you fine, why not use those kernels?
You could create your own branch of the tree dedicated to stability and security fixes.
Stay away from Linus' tree. Sounds like you want some QA, why not use a distro's kernel which hopefully does some QA.
But there is a problem; if you report a bug in a Redhat/SuSE kernel on the lk.ml you get a
'that's Redhat/SuSE problem - speak to them'.
I'm not sure why you think developers on LKML want to fix problems with RedHat/SuSE/IntertFavoriteDistroHere kernels running who knows what patches on top of them.
If you wrote some software and RedHat/SuSE/IntertFavoriteDistroHere repackaged it after applying some number of patches and then an end user came to you asking for help, would you really feel obligated to help them fix their problem if you already have more than enough on your plate as it is?