Category Archives: Energy efficiency

Magnetic storage using lasers alone

Posted on February 9, 2012 by Ray

Read an article today on AAAS Science Now online magazine (See Hot Idea for a Faster Hard Drive) on using lasers alone to toggle magnetic moments in specially designed ferro-magnetic materials. The disk industry has been experimenting with bit patterned … Continue reading →

Posted in Disk storage, Energy efficiency, Storage, Storage performance, Strategic Inflection Points, System effectiveness | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Making hardware-software systems design easier

Posted on December 13, 2011 by Ray

Recent research from MIT on a Streamlining Chip Design was in the news today.  The report described work was done  by Nyrav Dave PhD and Myron King to create a new programming language, BlueSpec that can convert specifications into hardware chip design (Verilog) or … Continue reading →

Posted in Decision making, Energy efficiency, R&D measures, Storage architecture, Strategic Inflection Points, System effectiveness | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Smart windows

Posted on November 29, 2011 by Ray

Heard a story yesterday about Smart Windows on NPR .  They were talking about new smart glass technology which uses a nano-crystal film coating to window panes that can change heat transmission characteristics of the glass. Apparently the nano-crystal film can … Continue reading →

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Smart thermostats make for smarter grids

Posted on November 1, 2011 by Ray

We have been discussing off and on how smart power meters (see Smart metering data storage appetite) and intelligent sensors (see the Sensor cloud comes home) such as smart thermostats generate copious amounts of data.  Sensors and meters such as these … Continue reading →

Posted in Distributed computing, Energy efficiency, Information economy, Market dynamics, Strategic Inflection Points, Strategy, Systems | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

DC is back

Posted on February 9, 2011 by Ray

Read an article in this month’s IEEE Spectrum on providing direct current (DC) power distribution to consumers.  Apparently various groups around the world are preparing standards to provide 24-V DC and 380-V DC power distribution to home and office. Why DC … Continue reading →

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SNIA illuminates storage power efficiency

Posted on October 26, 2010 by Ray

At SNW, a couple of weeks back, SNIA annouced the coming out of their green storage initiative’s new SNIA Emerald Program and the first public draft release of their storage power efficiency test  specification.  Up until now, other than SPC and … Continue reading →

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Building a green data center

Posted on June 30, 2010 by Ray

At NetApp’s Analyst Days last week David Robbins, CTO Information Technology, reported on a new highly efficient Global Dynamic Lab (GDL) data center which they built in Raleigh, North Carolina.  NetApp predicts this new data center  will have a power … Continue reading →

Posted in Energy efficiency, Systems | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment