Extreme Linux Server Available to North America

jcasman writes "CNet is covering an announcement from Japanese Linux provider Plat'Home on a low-cost, super tough Linux-based server, now available in the US, that can handle extreme heat and cold. 'The OpenMicroServer is kind of an "extreme" use server pushing the boundaries for normal, low-cost hardware. In a 624-day endurance test, the OpenMicroServer performed normally under 122 degree F conditions. The unit also employs a power efficient AMD Alchemy (MIPS) CPU and precise part placement based on thermo-fluid analysis to achieve semi-hermetic construction.'"

Wow!

[jd]

A server that could be used in North Dakota! (Seriously, that place is lethally hot in the summer and lethally cold the rest of the year. Rumour has it that the Indian burial mounds there were built by aliens, as the Indians didn't want to stay there long enough.)

An extreme end server that is ruggedized against severe temperatures has potential value in a number of areas. First, it certainly meets the thermal requirements for military-grade systems, so I would expect to see this getting some interested looks from that direction. Severe temperatures have killed voting machines, so that's another place that might be very interested in this server. Commodity e-voting with far more reliable hardware will sound a LOT more atractive to many States. The range isn't extreme enough to support some of the really harsh environments out there, but it would be good enough to get a tracked vehicle with a hose attachment into places too hot and too dangerous for human firefighters who wouldn't be able to stay that close to a fire.

Half the story

[JesseL]

How well does it work in a condensing atmosphere?

It's easy to work down to 0C when conditions are perfectly dry, it's another story when everything starts to sweat.

And what kind of airflow are we talking about when operating at 122F ambient?

Re:Ummm..freezing is now 0 F?

[joggle]

The value of Fahrenheit is that it has greater precision than Celsius (when just reporting the integer part of course). The other is that it is a bit easier for people to relate to: 0 degrees is cold!, 100 degrees is hot! Whereas in Celsius 0 degrees is somewhat cold and 100 degrees, well you're way past dead at that point.

Re:Extreme?

[JungleBoy]

I agree as well. I regularly need embedded servers/controllers and ethernet switches that work down to -40 degrees (C/F are the same here). I install them on mountain tops in Alaska. What really annoys me is when the specs list -40 as the minimum operating temperatures, but they used crappy ethernet PHY chips that need to be kept warm, so they use a heater circuit. They never tell you this in the documentation, you just wonder why the power usage goes through the room when it gets cold.

Re:What about Canada?

[belg4mit]

What about Canada? You're just as guilty of centricism. What about Mexico, Panama, Honduras...

Re:Ummm..freezing is now 0 F?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, for someone used to celsius it is a lot easier to relate to celsius. Also, living in Finland where we get a fair share of snow in the winter, having 0 degrees celsius be the melting point of water is very useful, as anything less means dry snow and more means wet conditions.

Further, I just have to comment on the dying thing... I've been in saunas heated to over 100 degrees celsius lots of times and I'm still alive. Perhaps swimming around in boiling water isn't such a good idea though.

By the way, 0 degrees fahrenheit isn't all that cold...

Re:On that note

[MichaelSmith]

An interesting side note though: I wonder how reliable those estimations are. I mean it's not like we've exposed human test subjects to outer space to check how long it takes them to die, right?

One guy was exposed to vacuum when a pressure suit failed during tests. He was recompressed without incident after about a minute.

Chimpanzees were deliberately exposed to vacuum in testing. They survived as well.