Microsoft takes the fast route to image processing efficiency with Dell solutions Web mapping service

“With the new approach to our site design, coupled with the Dell Modular Data Center solution, we project roughly an 8x reduction in cost when compared to traditional models.”

Brad Clark, group program manager, Bing Imagery Technologies

Customer profile Company: © Bing™ Maps Country: United States Benefits Industry: Technology • Reduce power consumption Employees: 89,403 • Deliver fast throughput Web: www.Bing.com • Accelerate IT deployment • Create a model for future sites Business need Maps needed a cost-effective data center solution that could be quickly deployed.

Solution Customized Dell™ Modular Data Centers enable rapid deployment of highly efficient infrastructure. At Microsoft Bing Maps, technology imitates art. The Bing Imagery Technologies team takes diverse satellite, aerial, bird’s eye, and street-side imagery and stitch them together to form visual mosaics for Bing Maps. Given its compute- and data-intensive mission, and the huge scale of its operations, the team requires enormous amounts of processing power, data storage capacity, and memory. It measures its storage needs in petabytes, its memory needs in terabytes, and its processing needs in tens of thousands of cores. At the same time, the team must work continuously to drive down the cost of processing this data.

When it came time to launch a processing and storing terabytes new imagery-processing site of data on an hourly basis. “From a power at the edge of the Colorado “We produce hundreds of terabytes Rockies, the Bing Imagery consumption each day,” notes Ryan Tracy, IT Technologies team (BITs) operations lead for Bing Imagery perspective, Dell comes studied its options carefully. It Technologies. “We generate about wanted to find a no-frills data in at 180 kilowatts of ten terabytes per hour. Our record center infrastructure that was is three petabytes in four days. So power per container, highly efficient, highly reliable, we have a significant amount of extremely scalable, and quick which lowers our power processing going on.” to deploy. It found its answer in consumption by 80% Dell™ Modular Data Centers, The requirements didn’t stop which are helping the team build there. The team needed a and delivers roughly five a highly efficient, state of the art modular solution that could times the amount of imagery processing microsite. be quickly deployed to add capacity to support growth and compute density. That The route to the Modular Data new partner needs. In addition obviously lowers the Center to creating imagery for Bing Maps, the organization produces The team’s road to a more efficient electrical bill.” geospatial imagery for various microsite began when the strategic partners. organization was making plans Brad Clark, group program manager, Bing Imagery Technologies to move its legacy containerized data-processing infrastructure to a new site that could accommodate additional capacity Technology at work and ongoing growth. Hardware The team found a workable, Dell Modular Data Centers eight-acre patch of ground AMD®-based Dell Nucleon in Longmont, Colorado, servers northwest of . The requirements for the microsite InfiBand networking from were aggressive. Bing Maps Mellanox® needed an extremely cost- effective, highly efficient solution Services to power high-performance Infrastructure Consulting compute-and storage-intensive Services geospatial applications running a customized parallel processing Custom Services and system built on Windows Server Integration 2008 and SQL Server 2008. The Deployment solution needed to be up to the challenges that come with Video » Bing Maps’ team Tom Barclay, Brad Clark and Ryan Tracy

On the power and cooling front, custom geospatial applications the team wanted a modular it runs, Clark says. For example, solution that could make they changed the server design “In working with Dell, maximum use of free air cooling to meet the unique storage we were able to build to capitalize on Colorado’s and I/O needs of the BITs climate. What’s more, it wanted processing environment and they a microsite that’s cost- to achieve an extremely low integrated InfiniBand networking effective, reliable, agile, power usage effectiveness (PUE) infrastructure into the solution. ratio—a key measure of data and rugged, that could “Dell closely partnered with us center energy efficiency. for the duration of the project on be located in extreme Choosing the Dell solution all aspects,” he says. “We really challenged everything to keep environments within Bing Maps personnel talked to costs low. The Dell guys were various countries around multiple vendors before settling cut from the same cloth. We on Dell. At a product level, they just made sure that everything the globe.” liked the modularity, superior that was needed was really PUE, low overall power utilization, needed. Dell realized that we Brad Clark, group program manager, and high density of the Dell were unorthodox, and they were Bing Imagery Technologies Modular Data Center, according willing to jump in with us.” to Clark. At an engineering level, they were impressed with the Fast deployment speed expertise of the Dell Data Center Rapid deployment was another Solutions team who designed over-arching need for the team. the Modular Data Center and The organization wanted the customized the solution, tailoring ability to bring on new IT capacity it to the needs of Bing Maps. quickly to support new products, new partnerships, and ongoing “Dell had a solution that was growth. designed for high efficiency, density, and low cost,” Clark says. In its Longmont experience, the “Their container allowed us to team learned that it can now have a flexible IT unit, which gave have a microsite up and running us room to customize or modify within 60 days, assuming all to meet our needs. It was a clean government permits are in place, and simple solution, and it was according to Clark. obvious that we were not going “We have the design now, and to be paying for items within the it can be put anywhere, as long solution that we didn’t need.” as you can find land that is The Dell DCS engineers on the relatively flat and has power and project went to great lengths networking,” he says. “We now to accommodate the specific have a reference site, we have needs of Bing Maps and the the design, and we have a great partner in Dell that can produce environment, rather than fans in the IT gear and the containers each of the servers. in the time-frame that we put in “I thought that was a smart and place. And we’ve proven that we clever approach,” Clark says of can turn those containers on in the central fan. “And having the three weeks, from dropping them evaporative cooling system in from a truck to turning them live. a dry climate like the Colorado So everything’s up and running Front Range is perfect. It makes within 60 days. That’s a pretty sense. It drives lower operating amazing feat.” costs. It’s just better all the way “In working with Dell, we were around.” Video » able to build a microsite that’s Time-lapse construction of Ultimately, “better all the way the Bing Maps microsite cost-effective, reliable, agile, and around” describes the feeling rugged, that could be located of the Bing Maps’ team when in extreme environments within it comes to working with the various countries around the Dell Data Center Solutions team globe,” he notes. to design and deploy Modular ‘Better all the way around’ Data Centers at the Bing Maps Imagery microsite in Colorado. “When I first looked at the design “They had the best solution and of the Dell Modular Data Center, the best team, which was well I saw that it’s very clean and it’s aligned with our site philosophy,” very elegant,” Clark says. “It’s very Clark says. “The whole Dell team well thought-out. And when you was just fantastic on all fronts.” get inside the container, it’s very quiet.” The quiet environment is made possible by the Dell Modular Data Center’s use of a central fan system that cools the

View Dell case studies at: Dell.com/casestudies

Availability and terms of Dell Services vary by region. For more information, visit: dell.com/servicedescriptions © July 2011, Dell Inc. Dell is a trademark of Dell Inc. Intel, Intel Xeon, and the Intel logo are registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. Microsoft, the Microsoft logo, and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. Other trademarks and trade names may be used in this document to refer to either the entities claiming the marks and names or their products. This case study is for informational purposes only. dell makes no warranties, express or implied, in this case study. Reference # 10009998