[ntp:questions] Keeping NTP Honest

[Ryan Malayter]

On Wed, Jul 15, 2009 at 9:00 PM, Richard B.
Gilbert<rgilbert88 at comcast.net> wrote:

> My machines run 24x7.  They don't suck THAT much power.

A typical dual-socket server uses roughly 400 watts at idle. At a
rough US$0.10 per kWh, doubled for cooling, that's US$700 in power per
year. If you can save 50% of that by shutting down idle servers for 12
hours per day, that's $350+ in savings per server.

Say my data center has 50 servers, which is small by industry
standards. If I can shut 40 of them down for 12 hours a day, that's
US$17500 in instant savings for my company. If you have 1000 servers,
like many organizations, that's $350K in savings for very little
effort. There is also the positive environmental impact of burning
less coal, the possibility of tax credits, vendor bonuses, and good
feelings.

It's a trade secret, but some estimates peg Google's number of servers
at over 500000 (not a typo). Power is a huge operational cost for
computers.

-- 
RPM