Collaborating to build faster, more efficient data centers

As more and more users are discovering the benefits of cloud computing, the demands placed upon data centers for services with bigger, better, and faster data storage and access have increased ten-fold. And in a market growing more competitive by the hour, cloud-based service, content, and application providers are all looking to lower their data centers’ operating costs to attract this emerging user-base.

“More smart phones, more computers just put stress on the infrastructure to handle more and more data,” says TE Connectivity Director of Data Communications Technology Group David Helster of the market’s challenges. “And our customers are trying to expand data center capability without necessarily building new data centers.”

Modern data centers need faster computers, with more storage capacity.

To address this concern, engineers from TE Connectivity collaborated with customers and created the STRADA Whisper product line: a roster of products specifically designed to meet customers’ growing need for high-performing and efficient high-bandwidth interconnects.

These products include copper interconnects capable of transferring data at 25 Gbps (scalable up to 56 Gbps), as well as optical interconnections with speeds up to 400 Gbps, both of which will help to to significantly improve the operating efficiency of today’s data centers.

STRADA Whisper connector: the Next-Gen 25Gbps Connector  

That same collaborative thinking was also used to develop TE Connectivity’s new ultra-slim 33 AWG copper cables, which offer better airflow, shorter distances between boards and components, and higher-density optical connections.

A unique product like this allows for much cooler electronic components, as well as higher and more densely packed interconnections both on and between boards.

TE Connectivity thin cables allow data centers to grow smaller and yet more productive.

“Customers have chips that do amazing things, but they often need help from TE Connectivity to get data from one chip to another, ” said TE Connectivity’s Senior Principal Engineer Chad Morgan. He goes on to explain his Data Communications Advanced Development Group’s thoughts on collaborating with customers. “We specialize in examining customer applications in order to help squeeze more bandwidth through a tighter space. Often we help do so in a more power-efficient manner and at a lower cost.”
The engineers’ efforts are leading to a new type of data center, one that can be smaller yet still offer optimal performance. This, in turn, allows the location of these centers to be much more flexible than in the past, which is especially important when one considers the fact that designers and cloud-based service and content providers can now build smaller, faster, and more thermally efficient new centers near cooling surfaces, something that will definitely lower their operational costs.

To learn more about high-performance copper and fiber interconnect innovations, visit www.everyconnectioncounts.com