Talk:1737: Datacenter Scale

I think the character in Panel 1 is Science Girl and not Hairbun. PoconoChuck (talk) 12:20, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

While the comic is obviously exxaggerating, there are situations where this could make a certain amount of sense. IF you can design a server so that most or all of the components reach end-of-life at about the same time, then if a hard drive fails on one server, every other component of that server is likely to fail soon as well.

If you install entire server racks or server rooms at the same time, where every machine contains components with the same basic life cycle...

then in theory, once the first component fails, you can ignore it until mass component failures causes the entire rack/room to fall below a certain readiness level.

At that point, there's no reason to pay a technician to spend several days removing and replacing half the individual components throughout that rack/room, when the other half are just going to fail in the next few months anyway. In theory, it might be economically more efficient just to scrap everything at once, bring in brand-new server replacements, and re-sync the needed data from a networked backup.

in real life, it's very hard to build a server that will reliably degrade on schedule.... but with the right tradeoffs, and enough long-term performance data, it might eventually become possible to do so. 162.158.74.101 04:48, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

The title text is referring to The Last Question by Isaac Asimov.

EpicWolverine (talk) 04:56, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

I cannot help but read this in a fake Yorkshire accent. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Yorkshiremen_sketch 141.101.98.113 09:55, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

I wonder how closely the AC and Douglas Adams' Deep Thought are related?