Modern computer networking hardware enables physically separate computing devices to communicate with one another orders of magnitude faster than was possible with prior generations of networking hardware. Consequently, it has become more practical to perform digital data processing at locations remote from the user requesting such processing, or on whose behalf such processing is being performed. Large quantities of data processing capability are being aggregated into centralized locations that comprise dedicated hardware and support systems including hundreds or thousands of computing devices, typically mounted in vertically oriented racks. Such a collection of computing devices, as well as the associated hardware necessary to support such computing devices, and the physical structure that houses the computing devices and associated hardware, is traditionally referred to as a “data center”. Because computing devices consume energy and generate heat when performing processing, the aggregation of large quantities of computing devices in a single data center results in large amounts of power consumption and large quantities of heat being generated. Traditionally, to control the costs of providing energy to such computing devices, electrical power delivery components are designed only to be able to safely provide electrical power up to a defined maximum.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds