Clusters at Home? 30
dallastgi asks: "Sitting at my desk (a bargain second hand, due to lack of drawers) I looked at the side and realized I could build a nice little cluster, on either side of it. It already has wooden rails for rack mounts, holes in the back (from previous cables for computers) for cooling, and several computers in the cupboard. I just needs a door, power and cooling ducts. What is the best possible way to power 6+ motherboards, with a minimal amount of power-points and heat dissipation? What is the best way to cool those CPU's in minimal space? I'm sure many others on Slashdot have thought about their own clusters, so what are your recommendations on how to go about this?"
With all those computers (Score:3, Funny)
My first thought as well (Score:4, Informative)
How to keep it cool. Hmmm. Eh moving a lot of air with a fan usually works. Again this adds to the noise.
Put it in some room wich you can ventilate. Get a big fan and blow it through your rack. If needed use an airco to cool the room.
Most people like their working room a little bit warmer then computers like their room. If you add more computers they might out vote you and force you to admin them in freezing air.
So my answer? I wouldn't put a dozen computers in my desk. In fact I haven't my setup uses a long extension cable and a kvm box. Very very quit. No bulky PC or cables to hide. Nice cooling on the PC. In fact since it is winter I even have to switch some fans off as the HD's are getting a bit cold.
Just curious (Score:2)
Re:Just curious (Score:5, Funny)
Probably all those beowulf cluster jokes. They get to you after a while you know.
Re: What are you going to do with that cluster? (Score:2)
Re:Just curious (Score:1)
My dnet keyrate used to kick ass when I worked at a computer store.
I had something like 10 PCs and Mac all running the dnet client and pumping up my keyrate.
But that was like 5 years go, my keyrate is a bit lower now, but the 2 machines that I'm running it on now are a lot faster.
LK
Cut to the chase (Score:4, Funny)
So, you're imagining a Beowulf cluster?
I just needs (Score:3, Funny)
We just needs our precious! Gollum,gollum!
Mini-itx cluster (Score:5, Informative)
But yeah.. what do you want the cluster for?
Interesting Read on ITX Cluster (Score:5, Informative)
If you have the sort of application which scales well across a parallel processing environment then even the rather underpowered Via Mini-Itx boards would do a good job.
If you had a cluster of Prescott P4's you could probably heat your house all winter.
Thank god (Score:4, Funny)
Check out Some notes on how to build a Linux cluster [gdargaud.net] and Linux Cluster HOWTO [tldp.org]. Good luck!
DANGER WILL ROBINSON!!! (Score:5, Informative)
Sitting at my desk (a bargain second hand, due to lack of drawers) I looked at the side and realized I could build a nice little cluster, on either side of it. It already has wooden rails for rack mounts, holes in the back (from previous cables for computers) for cooling, and several computers in the cupboard.
Never, ever, EVER put electronic parts anywhere in the general vicinity of wood - you're just asking for a conflagration if you do.
One of my best friends was in a professor in a big EE lab that had some benches and risers made of wood - and subsequently burned to the ground. Thereafter he spent several years of his life doing nothing but filling out millions of dollars worth of claims with insurance companies. Trust me - you do not want to go there.
[And he was one of the lucky ones - he got out unscathed.]
Re:DANGER WILL ROBINSON!!! (Score:2)
Poor bastard. So step one in building your own cluster in your desk is "Get the best insurance policy available, valuing your collection of Pez dispensers as 'irreplaceable heirlooms'."
Re:DANGER WILL ROBINSON!!! (Score:4, Interesting)
Never, ever, EVER put electronic parts anywhere in the general vicinity of wood - you're just asking for a conflagration if you do.
The temperature that wood burns at: roughly 450 degress F.
When is the last time you've seen a properly maintained computer system burst into flames?
I've seen chips burn, plastic melt, but I've never seen a system that was cleared of dust burst into flames. If you keep your computer in a shop full of wood chips and oil, then I could see a problem...
Computer systems tend not to have a lot of items inside that can sustain a fire. You can test this for yourself -- find a lighter and some old computers: try to create a sustained fire. Be careful of dripping plastic, it'll burn you.
I would be more worried about cheap (faulty) electronics in the home -- clock radios where you missed the recall, old VCRs, etc. That probably isn't as much of a risk as faulty home wiring and mice though.
As for a shelf full of electronic equipment, I've heard of people using mineral oil in transformers, which is flammable. Transformers, regardless of the oil, will fail in spectacular, much-spark inducing ways if they ever develop a leak. UPSs with improper batteries or circuits may also be fire hazards -- APC replaced my little UPS a year ago because of a faulty circuit. I've seen monitors fail in interesting ways, and they tend to be filled with dust. I've never seen one catch on fire, but I wouldn't be surprised if they do. I tend to turn mine off when I'm not in the room.
Considering how many computers are out there on wooden desks, and how many televisions, radios, vcrs, TVs, etc are on wooden entertainment centers, if the average piece of electronics equipment presented a fire hazard, homes would be burning down left and right.
Re:DANGER WILL ROBINSON!!! (Score:3, Informative)
I've posted this before, but clusters do catch fire. That fire was started by a server in a wooden cabinet, if I remember a fan failed.
Things do burn... (Score:2)
Re:DANGER WILL ROBINSON!!! (Score:1)
If your heating is deficient... (Score:1, Redundant)
It will do a great job of heating your legs, but only if you can stand the fan noise...
But seriously, under your desk is not the place where you want to put a cluster.
Re:If your heating is deficient... (Score:3, Interesting)
if it's made from mini-itx's or similars.. why not?
could end up taking less thatn 600wats total anyways.
we built one of those last year (Score:5, Interesting)
Everything is made of metal, using ready-made beams to which we attached the motherboards with integrated Broadcom NICs. The cluster (diskless, headless) has been running fine since then. We have one power supply per node in order to maximize cooling and avoid wiring errors if adding motherboard plugs to power supplies : design was made with CATIA V5R6, calculations were done by graduate students in engineering using Flo Therm, and they predicted the temperature inside the cluster within 1 degree C : 27 degrees at steady state for 19 ambient.
The only detail we had forgotten was to make buttons for power and reset, since they are only to be found in ready-made cases ; we lost hours to find the proper socket size on Radiospares.
The design took about 20 hours, the fabrication about one week, software installation (having to find the proper driver for the NICs for clustermatic, setting up PXE) two days, we saved maybe 30 % of the total cost (here about 4000 euros for 8 Athlon 2400 nodes with 1 Gb RAM), had a lot of fun and learning.
Clusterix (Score:4, Informative)
a different problem with wooden housing (Score:3, Informative)
Even if you're comfortable about the fire risk, you'll need some VERY good cooling -- essentially, keeping the interior below 75F throughout -- to avoid another problem.
Even if the heat doesn't cause warping, eventually the wood joints will start shrinking and/or becoming brittle, causing the desk to fall apart.
Even if you don't mind losing the desk (and the work you put into customizing it), collapse of those wooden rails might damage some equipment.
What do you plan to DO with it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Perhaps you have an idea what you would do with it? If you don't, then I would suggest spending your time thinking about why you need a cluster, before building one. Building a small cluster is nearly (not quite) like putting together a Lego model - everything is commodity parts, from the boards to the cpus, to the ethernet cables and the switch, etc - even the cluster software is free and easily available. Putting together a cluster will teach you a little, but unless you have plans to use that knowledge personally and/or in the future (ie, job prospects), your time, money and resources may be better spent on other things.
One must wonder... (Score:2)