US 10,321,608 B1Granted

Coordinated cooling using rack mountable cooling canisters

AssigneeAmazon Technologies, Inc.

InventorsChristopher Strickland Beall, Felipe Enrique Ortega Gutierrez, Darin Lee Frink

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Abstract

A cooling canister includes a canister body with an opening in the canister body that is configured to couple with a corresponding opening in a canister body of an adjacent cooling canister in a rack. Servers are coupled with the cooling canister and a set of fans are coupled with the cooling canister. The cooling canister provides at least partial airflow isolation between an airflow through the set of servers coupled with the cooling canister and other airflows through other servers in the rack. In the event of a control anomaly, such as a fan failure, the opening in the canister body of the cooling canister is configured to permit airflow between the cooling canister and an adjacent cooling canister to supplement an airflow through the cooling canister. In some embodiments, a dampers is included in the opening in the canister body of the cooling canister.

Claims21

Dependent claims

A computing system, comprising:

a server rack;
servers mounted in the rack;
a plurality of cooling canisters mounted inside the rack, wherein individual ones of the cooling canisters comprise:
a canister body mounted inside the rack and distinct from other canister bodies mounted inside the rack, the canister body configured to couple with a corresponding set of the servers, the corresponding set of the servers comprising a plurality of the servers, the plurality of servers mounted inside the cooling canister, the canister body at least partially enclosing:
opposing lateral sides of two or more servers of the set of the servers, a top surface of one of the set of the servers, and a bottom surface of another one of the set of the servers, such that air flowing through the set of the servers flows through the canister body;
and
an opening in the canister body configured to couple with a corresponding opening in a canister body of an adjacent cooling canister mounted inside the rack;
and
a group of fans, wherein respective ones of the plurality of cooling canisters are configured to couple with respective sets of one or more fans of the group of fans,
wherein, for one of the sets of fans coupled to a corresponding cooling canister, in the case of a fan of the set of fans not being in operation, the opening in the canister body of the corresponding cooling canister is configured to permit a supplemental flow of air between the corresponding cooling canister and a corresponding adjacent cooling canister in the rack to cool the subset of servers coupled to the corresponding cooling canister.

7 more elements

A method, comprising:

coupling a canister body of a first cooling canister in a first rack position of a rack, the canister body at least partially enclosing opposing lateral sides of two or more servers of a set of servers mounted inside the first cooling canister, a top surface of one of the set of servers, and a bottom surface of a bottom server of another one of the set of servers that are mounted inside the first cooling canister, such that air that flows through the set of servers in the first rack position flows through the canister body of the first cooling canister;
coupling a canister body of a second cooling canister in a second rack position of the rack such that air that flows through an additional set of servers mounted inside the second cooling canister in the second rack position flows through the canister body of the second cooling canister;
and
aligning an opening in the canister body of the first cooling canister with an opening in the canister body of the second cooling canister, such that the aligned openings permit airflow between the first cooling canister and the second cooling canister to compensate for an air flow deficit in an airflow through the first cooling canister or through the second cooling canister.

1 more element

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.