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What "intel-specific integrations"? Cloudflare specifically talks about how they keep their stack runnable across a wide-range of platforms, including even enti

What "intel-specific integrations"? Cloudflare specifically talks about how they keep their stack runnable across a wide-range of platforms, including even entirely different instruction sets (e.g. ARM). Their own words support my statement. I'm pretty sure it was a "drop-in place" move, and they say absolutely nothing to the contrary. They benchmarked a system that performed better than their existing system for whatever criteria they targeted, and chose it. Story at 11. Saying they "abandoned" Intel is uproarious given that if Intel pushes out a new 128-core Xeon at a decent price, they'd as easily "abandon" AMD for Intel.

jgrahamc 7y ago
As I say in another comment... AMD makes sense for us today because of the performance per watt. We continue to keep our software ARM-ready and look at ARM-based solutions. We also continue to look at Intel. We'll use what gives us the best requests per watt. But it is notable that these are our first servers wit NO Intel components at all.
- ohyeshedid 7y ago
  Don't mean to hijack, but I'm definitely curious. Since you're the CTO of Cloudflare, and you posted the OP; Why did you replace the word 'Chose', in the linked title, with the word 'abandoned' here? That comes across as real click-baity.
- jjeaff 7y ago
  I'm curious why requests per watt is an important metric? Are you running up against some sort of heat limit or optimizing for electricity cost? Seems like requests per amortized dollar all in would make more sense. Or requests per cubic foot of data center space if that is your limitation.
  - fierarul 7y ago
    This is a good question and I would like to learn the answer too. According to some napkin calculations, the CPU is $5000 and will be kept in service, I guess, 5 years. The US average price is 13 cents / kWh so this 225 watts CPU will cost $1280 in electricity over those 5 years. Colocation price is probably low, let's say $50 / 1U server / month. So that's another $3000. Why is electricity the most important here? I guess because you can't lower the other 2 costs very much? But isn't the CPU price itself based on the power savings it does provide?
    - tbyehl 7y ago
      Data center space is generally plentiful. Power and cooling, which for most purposes can be considered equivalent, are the scarce resource. CloudFlare is trading half their server density[0] for a ~25% gain in performance-per-watt and performance-per-node[1]. Power is the whole ball-game at scale. [0] https://blog.cloudflare.com/a-tour-inside-cloudflares-g9-servers/ https://blog.cloudflare.com/a-tour-inside-cloudflares-g9-ser... [1] https://blog.cloudflare.com/an-epyc-trip-to-rome-amd-is-cloudflares-10th-generation-edge-server-cpu/ https://blog.cloudflare.com/an-epyc-trip-to-rome-amd-is-clou...
      - fierarul 7y ago
        Ah, so it's not about power being a big expense, but being a constraint that is limiting their growth: > We are constrained by the data centers’ power infrastructure which, along with our selected power distribution units, leads us to power cap for each server rack.

jgrahamc 7y ago

As I say in another comment... AMD makes sense for us today because of the performance per watt. We continue to keep our software ARM-ready and look at ARM-based solutions. We also continue to look at Intel. We'll use what gives us the best requests per watt. But it is notable that these are our first servers wit NO Intel components at all.

ohyeshedid 7y ago
Don't mean to hijack, but I'm definitely curious. Since you're the CTO of Cloudflare, and you posted the OP; Why did you replace the word 'Chose', in the linked title, with the word 'abandoned' here? That comes across as real click-baity.
jjeaff 7y ago
I'm curious why requests per watt is an important metric? Are you running up against some sort of heat limit or optimizing for electricity cost? Seems like requests per amortized dollar all in would make more sense. Or requests per cubic foot of data center space if that is your limitation.
- fierarul 7y ago
  This is a good question and I would like to learn the answer too. According to some napkin calculations, the CPU is $5000 and will be kept in service, I guess, 5 years. The US average price is 13 cents / kWh so this 225 watts CPU will cost $1280 in electricity over those 5 years. Colocation price is probably low, let's say $50 / 1U server / month. So that's another $3000. Why is electricity the most important here? I guess because you can't lower the other 2 costs very much? But isn't the CPU price itself based on the power savings it does provide?
  - tbyehl 7y ago
    Data center space is generally plentiful. Power and cooling, which for most purposes can be considered equivalent, are the scarce resource. CloudFlare is trading half their server density[0] for a ~25% gain in performance-per-watt and performance-per-node[1]. Power is the whole ball-game at scale. [0] https://blog.cloudflare.com/a-tour-inside-cloudflares-g9-servers/ https://blog.cloudflare.com/a-tour-inside-cloudflares-g9-ser... [1] https://blog.cloudflare.com/an-epyc-trip-to-rome-amd-is-cloudflares-10th-generation-edge-server-cpu/ https://blog.cloudflare.com/an-epyc-trip-to-rome-amd-is-clou...
    - fierarul 7y ago
      Ah, so it's not about power being a big expense, but being a constraint that is limiting their growth: > We are constrained by the data centers’ power infrastructure which, along with our selected power distribution units, leads us to power cap for each server rack.