(Crossposted here from the Number Crunching thread)

I regularly ask the SETI@Home team if they have any hardware requirements to ensure the project has what it needs to keep going, and finally a requirement has emerged, so we have our rumored fundraiser... the SETI@Home team requires funds for:

26 x Seagate 16TB Exos X16 7200 RPM SATA 3.5" Enterprise Hard Drives



There will be 22 for storage and 2 for filesystem in a 24-drive NAS bay, plus 2 spares in the unlikely case of failures. The team already has the bay; we only need supply the drives. This request may be "not very sexy" as Jeff Cobb put it, but it's one of those essential requirements that keeps SETI@Home running properly, and more importantly efficiently, for the long term.


What is the fundraising goal?

The best cost I could find for these drives is $419 each (from Amazon) so the goal is 26 x $419 = $10,894. This doesn't include tax and shipping, and the cost may change in the interim (they are on sale), so any overage will still probably be required.

I will be providing updates on the total contibutions through the SETI@home Donation History, and for those donating via PayPal, the GPUUG Donation Tracker.


Why is this required?

First: too many spindles! SETI@Home's data is currently spread out over 120+ 2TB drives in UC Berkeley's Co-Location datacenter. Since the project has to pay UC Berkeley per drive for this storage, it's gotten to the point where it's costing the project far too much money, something that unfortunately is always in short supply. As well, it's a waste of electricity (which the SETI@Home project also has to pay for) to keep 120+ spindles spinning where 24 of the same power would do.

Second: Reliability. The 2TB drives currently used are getting near end-of-life and are becoming unreliable and failing. With 2.5M hrs. MTBF (Mean Time Between Failures) all of these new drives should last for decades or as long as they are required. But, we'll get a couple of spares just in case!


What's the timeframe?

This fundraiser will run for two weeks until Jan. 13th. In my experience, it won't take nearly that long to reach the goal.


How do we contribute?

Simply make your donation as normal through the UC Berkeley Donate to SETI@home portal, or if you are donating via Paypal, via the GPU Users Group's Donation directly to SETI@Home option. You won't need to do anything but donate normally as any donation during this timeframe is going to be applied to this fundraiser.

Please feel free to post your confirmation number or other record of your confirmation here! It's excellent to see the generosity. All donations large and small are much appreciated and thank you!


Will there be a matching donation?

I don't have the funds to do a matching donation, but if I see things are going well by Dec. 31st and we're at or close to the halfway point, I'm kicking in one thousand dollars! So the earlier you can donate, the better!

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The goal is reached in less than two days! I'm supposed to keep this pinned, but I will lock it and please use the linked NC thread for any discussion.

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