Of Facebook Datacenter, Quanta, & Open Server Model

Quanta reveals specifications of the server that power Facebook. Quanta Computer is a Taiwan-based manufacturer of notebook computers and other hardware like servers. This company claims to be the world's largest cloud datacentre hardware provider that makes about a quarter of the world's laptop computers and has recently gotten into custom servers for big operators like the social media behemoth.

Mike Yang, GM & VP of Quanta in the recently held cloud and big data summit in Vietnam revealed details of how they built the server which is more efficient while clutter-free and minimal based on an open model that others can replicate.

‘Remove anything in our servers that does not contribute to efficiency' was the dictat from Facebook for Quanta, says Mike. When asked what you mean by ‘anything', it's paint, bezel, spare memory, PCIe slots, etc, says Mike.

Mike also went on to explain how Facebook uses four different servers for different tasks. Although there was not any clear explanation of how the servers differ in terms of design, the servers fit three abreast into the 21-inch-wide Open Rack format, adds Mike. All this specifications that constitute FB servers make data centre 38% more efficient and 24% less expensive, says Mike.

This model that Facebook use for their servers are based on open model called Open Compute Project (OCP) . And the good news is that Quanta is going to make its open based server model to the world by the end of the year. So, here comes the chance for others to try and replicate the open server design in their datacenters.

The goal of the Open Compute Project was to build to most efficient computing infrastructures at the lowest possible cost and share the innovations in the data center for the industry to use and improve upon. Today the specifications are available for anyone to try.

(The author was hosted in Ho Chi Minh City by Intel)