Heating Houses with Nerd Power

colinmcr · 21 May 2015 at 03:52

I saw this story via the bbc about how some data centres are placing units in peoples homes which help heat their homes in the process.
What with doing a fair bit of Folding over the years I can certainly say its kept my house warmer

Do any of you have weird and wonderful setups that aid heating your homes?

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-32816775

koooowweeee · 21 May 2015 at 06:01

I used to have 2 gtx480 and my room got warm with rhem 2 on water

Illgresi · 21 May 2015 at 06:06

My PC acts more like a vacuum cleaner than a heater!

koooowweeee · 21 May 2015 at 06:09

Illgresi said:
My PC acts more like a vacuum cleaner than a heater!

You could be onto something there, does it have wheels?

Illgresi · 21 May 2015 at 06:21

koooowweeee said:
You could be onto something there, does it have wheels?

This is far too Blade Runner for me. When my PC cleans my flat, brings me beer and services me...y'know..that way...I think we need to call time on progress and go back to living in trees.

adolf hamster · 21 May 2015 at 09:47

My rig is in a tiny study thats had the radiator off since it was installed, i want that room warmed i just fire up bf4 for half an hour and let the 290x do the heating.

Can get intolerable though over long periods, and the desk is so large i cant reach the window.

bitslice · 21 May 2015 at 09:59

adolf hamster said:
My rig is in a tiny study thats had the radiator off since it was installed, i want that room warmed i just fire up bf4 for half an hour and let the 290x do the heating.

I do the same, it only consumes 150W but it is enough to heat the room after a few hours.

If they threw in an unused portion of their data link then this would be a fantastic idea.

On Holiday · 21 May 2015 at 10:16

What a ridiculous idea

arknor · 21 May 2015 at 11:34

The server in the radiator does not stop working when the unit is turned off, but the heat is pushed into an extractor on the outside wall. And in the unlikely event that a user needs heat but the internet is down and the radiator has nothing to work on, it starts performing dummy equations.

With data centres estimated to account for 1.5% of global electricity consumption (in 2010), this wastage is costly to businesses and to the environment too.

sounds rather eco friendly....
doubt your electric companies would let you stay on a commercial contract either?
feds probably be raiding from the heat in the winter lol

CREATIVE!11 · 21 May 2015 at 12:06

When I play gta 5 my graphics card sounds like a lawnmower... heats my room up nicely lol...

Flubble · 21 May 2015 at 12:20

sounds great, i'd be up for some free heat

bitslice · 21 May 2015 at 12:25

If they made a model that attached to a bed so your wife could put her cold feet on it, then the supercooling effect would let them overclock it to 5-6Ghz easily.

tamzzy · 21 May 2015 at 12:26

i run F@H during the winter months with my quadfire 7990 xD

subbytna · 21 May 2015 at 12:29

bitslice said:
If they made a model that attached to a bed so your wife could put her cold feet on it, then the supercooling effect would let them overclock it to 5-6Ghz easily.

Haha....I hear you

paradigm · 21 May 2015 at 12:32

What's a "computer server" :confused:

idiot articles are always annoying to read.

Devrij · 21 May 2015 at 12:38

When I was mining with 6 gpus my house was like a furnace even while it was snowing outside.

I actually posted my energy usage graphs comparing year on year gas and electric usage for anyone interested.

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=27405382&postcount=39

The noise was really bad though. Data centre equipment isn't exactly known for being quiet either so I'd want to know how that was being dealt with before signing up.

Ryan-3 · 21 May 2015 at 12:38

I see how this concept could be used.

In a city like New York, you could have the water fed into a huge watercooled data centre (I know there are other implications due to the water, NSA

, etc.., but i'll keep it simple). The water fed in is warmed as the servers are cooled, which then can be fed into the hot water system.

If the water is 30c warmer before being put into the heating system, then you save the energy required to heat by that 30c increase, (which when being kept simple is water in->water out with the data centre being put in series) and water requires 4.2kJ/litre to raise it by one degree. If 1000 litres are used in a day, you are saving 126MJ of energy, or 35kW/h.

Just a thought.

Judgeneo · 21 May 2015 at 12:39

Mine bitcoin and you can get warmer even cheaper.

Devrij · 21 May 2015 at 12:52

Judgeneo said:
Mine bitcoin and you can get warmer even cheaper.

Did you not look at my energy graphs? You would pay through the nose to mine bitcoin or any other altcoin, ASIC or not. It's not profitable to mine anymore (on most hardware) so the electric usage would just end up costing you more than the setup cost of one of these radiators.

I'm assuming the company absorbs the electricity cost for this scheme?

lsg1r · 21 May 2015 at 13:02

I know some big companies are 'reclaiming heat' from the server room to heat the offices when they have a server room in the same building, actually it might even be google doing this.

It does make sense because this heat reclamation thing is being pushed for houses too because it's more eco friendly and economical etc.

My pc is also pretty much all the heating I need in my office too

edit: nope it was amazon...
http://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/blogs/dept/building-science/using-server-farms-heat-buildings