Mining Farm Cooling

[jamesg]

I am starting to reach the limit of what I can cool with my mining farm and am wondering the best approach to take to sustain further expansion. I am currently 14 "rigs" most with 5 GPUs per box. I will be expanding further next week and was hoping to put off this until after the winter, but that is looking less and less likely.

I am in a 800sqft space with 20ft ceilings and a 3 ton HVAC unit that now seems to run 24/7.

So the big question is: What do you do to cool your 10Gh+ mining farm? Do you have pictures and or best practices?

[1713428609]

1713428609

[Swishercutter]

My 1200 sq/ft shop with 20ft ceilings stays at around 90deg F with the doors closed...I have no AC and I am only running about 3.5Gh/s.  I just have 2 box fans blowing down on the rigs.  It seems there is a 2-1 power usage to cool the rigs with AC from what others have said in this forum. 

I can't wait for winter...I wish I was pushing the hashrates you are but I don't envy your cooling costs.  You are basically running ~14kw worth of heaters constantly...let us know if you find something that works.

[dovewing2000]

I am starting to reach the limit of what I can cool with my mining farm and am wondering the best approach to take to sustain further expansion. I am currently 14 "rigs" most with 5 GPUs per box. I will be expanding further next week and was hoping to put off this until after the winter, but that is looking less and less likely.

I am in a 800sqft space with 20ft ceilings and a 3 ton HVAC unit that now seems to run 24/7.

So the big question is: What do you do to cool your 10Gh+ mining farm? Do you have pictures and or best practices?

i think non HVAC single unit AC is better choice if all ur rigs are running in the same room... probably with some kind of vent sucking air out and the AC only cooling the rigs...

[Bitcoin Swami]

This is the first time in my life I've actually wanted winter to come.

[JuanPabloCuervo]

I am starting to reach the limit of what I can cool with my mining farm and am wondering the best approach to take to sustain further expansion. I am currently 14 "rigs" most with 5 GPUs per box. I will be expanding further next week and was hoping to put off this until after the winter, but that is looking less and less likely.

I am in a 800sqft space with 20ft ceilings and a 3 ton HVAC unit that now seems to run 24/7.

So the big question is: What do you do to cool your 10Gh+ mining farm? Do you have pictures and or best practices?

K Supercomputer use water cooling.
Cray-2 was the first supercomputer to be fluorinet cooled.

Air cooling eats more power, makes more noise & does not cool as good.




another option is to make a pool of Mineral Oil..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJdUhtD1zns

[smoked_out]

I am starting to reach the limit of what I can cool with my mining farm and am wondering the best approach to take to sustain further expansion. I am currently 14 "rigs" most with 5 GPUs per box. I will be expanding further next week and was hoping to put off this until after the winter, but that is looking less and less likely.

I am in a 800sqft space with 20ft ceilings and a 3 ton HVAC unit that now seems to run 24/7.

So the big question is: What do you do to cool your 10Gh+ mining farm? Do you have pictures and or best practices?

Run an intake and exhaust inline fan, this would involve cutting a 2X6inch holes in the walls leading outside. This will significantly lower your electricity bill and decrease the amount of a/c you would be required to use. PM for more details

[JuanPabloCuervo]

I am currently 14 "rigs" most with 5 GPUs per box. .... 10Gh+ mining

i dont understand how you only get 10 gh from 14 rigs


about the cooling

1 water cooling is stupid
2 air cooling is the way to go
3 i suppose that you cant use some natural cooling in your place http://www.csia.org/HomeownerResources/ChimneySafetyInfo/HowYourChimneyWorks/tabid/114/Default.aspx


whats the best way in my opinion ?? a air pump (connected to a tank ? ) and split the exit to little tube for each card, ac is a waste of money on electricity

LOL...
my stupid PC does ~38°C @ 100% GPU load...

60x HD4650 does 1260MH/s
6x HD6990 does 4800MH/s.

[Sabi]

LOL...
my stupid PC does ~38°C @ 100% GPU load...

60x HD4650 does 1260MH/s
6x HD6990 does 4800MH/s.

Are you seriously running sixty HD4650s?  Seriously?  Why?

[JuanPabloCuervo]

oh boy so you really think that your cooling solution works for a farm ?, if water cooling what the solution PC farms will many data center will use it but guess what water cooling is just for gamers teens that want to be cool, to scale that to 60/79 GPU's is stupid and next to impossible to do

when you make comparative you make them about this that are very very similar try to apply that next time

dude...

the fastest supercomputer in the world is watercooled.
has 68544 waterblocks for the CPUs.
& 800 for the MBs.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K_computer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercomputing#Energy_consumption_and_heat_management

IBM Blue Waters
"closely packed elements require water cooling."

[Sabi]

Please answer my question.  Are you really running sixty HD4650s?  Watercooled too?

[RandyFolds]

I am in a 800sqft space with 20ft ceilings and a 3 ton HVAC unit that now seems to run 24/7.

Holy shit dude...you could be fighting like, 30,000watts with that unit. You just need an exhaust solution, not a 3 ton compressor.

[mrb]

I am in a 800sqft space with 20ft ceilings and a 3 ton HVAC unit that now seems to run 24/7.

Holy shit dude...you could be fighting like, 30,000watts with that unit. You just need an exhaust solution, not a 3 ton compressor.

Hum, no. 1 ton of cooling is 3517 Watt.  So a 3-ton HVAC can cool about 10.6kW of equipment, or a bit more assuming heat loss in the server room.

Some use no HVAC to cool 10.6kW of equipment, but that's a completely different DC cooling strategy

[sveetsnelda]

Blech.  If you weren't in FL, I'd suggest evap cooling.  You don't really have another option in FL besides AC, I'd imagine.  

I'm cooling:
4  x 5990s
38 x 6970s
8  x 6870s
4  x 5870s
all in one room.  Roughly 12,000 watts (just a little under).  Everything is being cooled buy a single window mounted evap cooler (in an adjacent room) that draws 285 watts at full fan/pump speed (and I shut it off at night).  Because an evaporative cooler is being used, I'm able to keep temperature *and* humidity in check.  If you want to run a large Bitcoin farm, a desert climate is definitely the way to go.

[sveetsnelda]

the fastest supercomputer in the world is watercooled.
has 68544 waterblocks for the CPUs.
& 800 for the MBs.

Um...  we're not comparing apples to apples here.  If I wanted to buy waterblocks, pumps, radiators, and tubing for all 54 of my cards, it could cost me well over $12,000 to get it done (not to mention a ton of my time).  That's over half of what I paid for the hardware I'm running.  That'd be a pretty foolish idea.  Also add the fact that I'd *still* need a way to get rid of the heat coming off of the radiators.  I'd rather throw that $12,000 into more hardware.

Water cooling doesn't magically make the cards run cooler -- it just allows you to get rid of the heat quicker.  In other words -- if a card gives off 200 watts in heat, putting on a water block doesn't suddenly make the card only give off 100 watts.  It's still 200w, and I _still_ have to get that heat out of the room.  In other words, I'd have to mount all of my radiators in a window or run water lines outside.  No thanks.  Water cooling only helps if you can't get rid of the heat quick enough.  Air coolers are more than enough in this situation.

If you wanted to stack thousands of GPUs on top of each other with no room to breathe, *then* we'll talk about water cooling.  My mining farm isn't a supercomputer with thousands of 1U boxes crammed against each other.

[jamesg]

i dont understand how you only get 10 gh from 14 rigs

Look at my sig for details.

Run an intake and exhaust inline fan, this would involve cutting a 2X6inch holes in the walls leading outside. This will significantly lower your electricity bill and decrease the amount of a/c you would be required to use. PM for more details

I will be PMing shortly.

Blech.  If you weren't in FL, I'd suggest evap cooling.  You don't really have another option in FL besides AC, I'd imagine.  

Why do you suggest that this evap cooling would not work in FL? I am going to look into it now, but any further information would be greatly appreciated.

EDIT: Also, it is very dry in my warehouse at the moment. Much dryer than anywhere else I go. Shouldn't I be keeping this environment at a certain humidity and couldn't an evap cooling system help with this?

[sveetsnelda]

Evap cooling wont work in FL because your relative humidity is already very high.  Evap coolers work by introducing cold water into the air through evaporation.  If the air is already saturated with water, more water wont be absorbed easily.  If your humidity is high and you run an evap cooler, you might as well just run a fan instead.

If it's dry in your warehouse, it still wont help much either.  It'll be dry for a little while, but running an evap cooler will saturate the air quickly.  You need a steady supply of dry air.  My $600 cooler will crank through 5500 CFM of air.  Circulate that around the building for 10 minutes and it'll be extremely humid in no time.

[jamesg]

Evap cooling wont work in FL because your relative humidity is already very high.  Evap coolers work by introducing cold water into the air through evaporation.  If the air is already saturated with water, more water wont be absorbed easily.  If your humidity is high and you run an evap cooler, you might as well just run a fan instead.

If it's dry in your warehouse, it still wont help much either.  It'll be dry for a little while, but running an evap cooler will saturate the air quickly.  You need a steady supply of dry air.  My $600 cooler will crank through 5500 CFM of air.  Circulate that around the building for 10 minutes and it'll be extremely humid in no time.

So based off of this information, my best bet is getting the hot air out of the building as quickly as possible and pulling in fresh air from outside.

Something like this -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5f_e4P6gMA

[sveetsnelda]

Yeah.  If you have a small room full of cards and no fresh air is circulated, they'll quickly overheat.  If you have a large room full of cards and no fresh air is circulated, they'll still overheat, but it'll take longer.  AC units are just heat pumps though...  if you have enough AC for the amount of heat being introduced to the room, there's no need to pull in any air from outside.  Depending on the placement of the AC, it would be worse in fact.  ...similar to having your AC on in the car but leaving the windows down.

If you don't have the AC capacity to cool the cards, shut the AC off and then just blow cooler air in one side and hot air out the other (exactly how my room is set up).  Even if you have fairly high air temperatures, you should be fine as long as you can make sure that no air gets recirculated across the cards.

[RandyFolds]

I am in a 800sqft space with 20ft ceilings and a 3 ton HVAC unit that now seems to run 24/7.

Holy shit dude...you could be fighting like, 30,000watts with that unit. You just need an exhaust solution, not a 3 ton compressor.

Hum, no. 1 ton of cooling is 3517 Watt.  So a 3-ton HVAC can cool about 10.6kW of equipment, or a bit more assuming heat loss in the server room.

Some use no HVAC to cool 10.6kW of equipment, but that's a completely different DC cooling strategy

Yes, and to fight watt for watt is moronic when simple flowthrough can handle the issue. Why run a huge compressor with your fans if the fans themselves can be sufficient? See smoked_out's post. Another option to increase efficiency would be to cool a small space with AC and draw air from the space, through the room, and out the exhaust. Look up the concept of a 'lung' for cooling indoor grows.

[Big Time Coin]

I also live in a desert climate, and wanted to use evap, but was afraid to use an evaporative cooler because of the high humidity it can generate.  But reading about it, I guess if the dew point is very low, the humidity coming out of the cooler stays around 50% anyway, which is not high enough to cause any damage to components. 

With refrigerated air it is hard to get the exhaust air out without polluting the supply air.  To get the enough fresh air flowing into the room so that the hot exhaust can be vented outside while also keeping the room temperature down has been very difficult and it's the main thing holding me back on my capacity right now. 

Giga, your high ceilings are key.  My shop is about 250 sq. ft. with 9 ft ceiling and poor insulation to the hot outside and the most I can pull is 12-13 GH/s with 24,000 btu ~= 3kw of cooling with refrigerated air.  I am also exhausting the hot air through a 6" by 14" duct and a 1500 cfm fan.  Insufficient and will be improved, but the electrical thing takes precedence and I'm still waiting for estimates from my electricians.  If I had a 20 ft ceiling it would make a big difference.  Just cut a hole in the wall at the top and put a 4500 cfm fan blowing all that hot air that collects out.