Photos: Taking the lid off Project Blackbox

21 May 2007 09:31

Sun's Project Blackbox is a working data centre that fits into a standard shipping container.

At JavaOne in San Francisco earlier this month, Sun showed off Project Blackbox, a working data centre from Sun that's engineered to fit into a standard shipping container 8 feet wide, 8 feet tall and 20 feet long. Sun is taking Project Blackbox on a tour of the US to show off its transportability and capabilities. The company first detailed the technology in October.

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A JavaOne attendee examines Project Blackbox, which can be built once and is then ready to be deployed anywhere.

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Inside, the unit enables a computing density of up to 1,250W per square foot using standard racks, systems and storage in conjunction with extreme cooling efficiency.

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The data centre utilises shock absorption and cooling capacity technology, and offers computing power that Sun says can be adapted to situations and conditions worldwide.

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Its computing density makes Project Blackbox capable of holding 120 Sun Fire CoolThreads T2000 servers, and managing and supporting up to 10,000 simultaneous desktop users.

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Simple external hookups provide AC power and cooling capacity. Fans and water-cooled heat exchangers provide in-circuit, energy-efficient water-cooling for the dense system design.

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Sun believes the technology will appeal to customers who are running out of space in their current data centres.

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Story URL: http://reviews.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/servers/0,1000001735,39287157,00.htm