NVIDIA PUE-PUEs Datacenter Efficiency Ratings, Calls For Application-Specific Metrics
The Register, Wednesday, May 15th, 2024
What good is great power use effectiveness if your DC is packed with inefficient kit?
Power use effectiveness - PUE for short - has long been the spec by which datacenter efficiency has been measured. But after nearly two decades Nvidia believes it's time for a new metric.
PUE itself is a rather simple measure of efficiency. It describes how much power consumed by datacenters goes toward compute, storage, or networking equipment - stuff that makes money - versus things like facility cooling, that don't. The closer the PUE is to 1.0, the more efficient the facility.
For example, a facility located in an arid climate may have a higher - and therefore worse - PUE because more power is required by air handlers to keep the datacenter cool. Meanwhile, a facility in the Nordics that can take advantage of free cooling year round would therefore have a lower PUE.