View Full Version : Sam Walton Taught Google More About How to Dominate the Internet Than Microsoft Ever Did
Jason Dunn
11-19-2005, 02:00 PM
<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20051117.html' target='_blank'>http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/...it20051117.html</a><br /><br /></div><i>"So why buy-up all that fiber, then? The probable answer lies in one of Google's underground parking garages in Mountain View. There, in a secret area off-limits even to regular GoogleFolk, is a shipping container. But it isn't just any shipping container. This shipping container is a prototype data center. Google hired a pair of very bright industrial designers to figure out how to cram the greatest number of CPUs, the most storage, memory and power support into a 20- or 40-foot box. We're talking about 5000 Opteron processors and 3.5 petabytes of disk storage that can be dropped-off overnight by a tractor-trailer rig. The idea is to plant one of these puppies anywhere Google owns access to fiber, basically turning the entire Internet into a giant processing and storage grid."</i><br /><br />Another thought-provoking article from Robert X. Cringely. Will it come to pass? Who knows - but what I do know is that despite all of Microsoft's best efforts, they're always several steps behind Google when it comes to Web-based applications and services.
Clinton Fitch
11-19-2005, 05:22 PM
Interesting article...
Someone said in an email to me this week that Google is the Matrix. I'm starting to believe it.
Regards,
...to figure out how to cram the greatest number of CPUs, the most storage, memory and power support into a 20- or 40-foot box.I'm not sure Google is so far ahead of Microsoft on this one. 20-40 foot box crammed full of CPUs and stuff? That sounds a lot like an Xbox 360! :lol:
Sorry, I know the "xbox is huge" jokes are so 3 years ago, but I just couldn't resist...
Jonathan1
11-19-2005, 07:04 PM
Makes perfect sense. If you are going to start offering up more bandwidth intensive content (Google Earth, Google Video, etc.) you need a pretty good pipe. P2P has shown that distributed content downloads are a very viable way of doing things as long as most of the senders have a nice phat pipe to play with. Google is probably doing this. They are preping an infrastructure for future apps.
ricksfiona
11-19-2005, 07:14 PM
One word: WOW :werenotworthy:
Typhoon
11-20-2005, 02:28 AM
Isn't it "petrabytes"? I could be wrong...
Jason Dunn
11-20-2005, 02:32 AM
Isn't it "petrabytes"? I could be wrong...
Petabyte is correct:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petabyte
Petra (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petra) is something else entirely. ;-)
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