Stop saying data centers in space. That’s not what anyone is building. They’re building satellites that contain computers. Already a solved problem. The only question is what density and what quality.
This video is the perfect example of why Scott Manley is incredibly irritating.
He spent an hour demonstrating why data centers in space are impossible, failed to mention half of the issues that make it impossible. Then closed the video saying it "remains challenging"....So he can do another five videos about it over the next few months.
Satellites and the Space Station have computers. So we have "data centers" in space.
But what is being discussed are 100 MW space data centers. Make the calculations....Those need a 20 x 20 mile radiator and a solar farm the same size. Those are space constructions at scifi level maybe for the next century.
The type of data centers we aiming to substitute at 1 GW...
Finishing the video saying this "remains challenging" its like spend an hour talking about Musk wanting to land on the Sun, listing half the issues and instead of identifying the craziness concluding it ...."remains challenging..."
> what is being discussed are 100 MW space data centers
Thats... not how engineering anything works.
20kw gives you a reasonable amount of compute, about a GB200 rack. That's pretty good for serving inference workloads. Starship is designed to deploy 50-100 of these satellites per launch. The claim from this video is the existing design can do it.
If the next generation of chips run hotter, require less energy to do more things, suddenly you have a data center worth of compute per launch. And those are exactly the goals for the upcoming few generations.
Maybe you misunderstood the point of the video? It was to address the poorly reasoned arguments about thermodynamics making cooling data centers in space impossible. Not that you can yeet a data center today.
Stop saying data centers in space. That’s not what anyone is building. They’re building satellites that contain computers. Already a solved problem. The only question is what density and what quality.
They'll say whatever is needed for investors to get in line.
Computers, 1998. AI data centers, smells like 2027.
TLDW - Starlink V3 design should be able to do 20kw of computers. It's a complex engineering challenge to scale it up.
This video is the perfect example of why Scott Manley is incredibly irritating.
He spent an hour demonstrating why data centers in space are impossible, failed to mention half of the issues that make it impossible. Then closed the video saying it "remains challenging"....So he can do another five videos about it over the next few months.
Satellites and the Space Station have computers. So we have "data centers" in space.
But what is being discussed are 100 MW space data centers. Make the calculations....Those need a 20 x 20 mile radiator and a solar farm the same size. Those are space constructions at scifi level maybe for the next century.
The type of data centers we aiming to substitute at 1 GW...
Finishing the video saying this "remains challenging" its like spend an hour talking about Musk wanting to land on the Sun, listing half the issues and instead of identifying the craziness concluding it ...."remains challenging..."
> what is being discussed are 100 MW space data centers
Thats... not how engineering anything works.
20kw gives you a reasonable amount of compute, about a GB200 rack. That's pretty good for serving inference workloads. Starship is designed to deploy 50-100 of these satellites per launch. The claim from this video is the existing design can do it.
If the next generation of chips run hotter, require less energy to do more things, suddenly you have a data center worth of compute per launch. And those are exactly the goals for the upcoming few generations.
Maybe you misunderstood the point of the video? It was to address the poorly reasoned arguments about thermodynamics making cooling data centers in space impossible. Not that you can yeet a data center today.