Financial Disaster Caused by a False Fire Alarm

On April 18, 2018, the Northern European Nasdaq transaction market was frozen until 2:00 p.m. local time, according to The Register, a well-known British tech news website. A fire alarm was reported in the core equipment room of the data center, and high-pressure inert gas was vented to extinguish the fire. The resulting high pressure generated thundering noises, which caused the racks to shake violently. As a result, the core equipment of the stock trading system broke down. Although Nasdaq has enabled the backup data center in Väsby, Sweden, the transaction system could not be restored until 2:00 p.m.

Huawei Storage Survived a Similar Trial in a Top-class Carrier’s Equipment Room

Data center breakdowns as a result of false fire alarms are not uncommon. The Register also mentioned that a large number of devices were damaged due to the same problem in a data center in Sydney four years ago. This resulted in large-scale complaints from tenants. In December 2017, the situation repeated itself once more in the core equipment room of a top-class carrier, where extensive equipment damage caused some services to stop for a week.

Storage devices of four vendors, including Huawei, were used in the core equipment room of the carrier. Huawei provided OceanStor Dorado V3 all-flash and OceanStor V3 hybrid-flash storage systems, with a total of 468 all-flash disk drives and 333 spinning disk drives. After the incident, 0 of Huawei’s 468 SSDs and only 4 of the 333 NL-SAS disks required replacing, with no corruption of the service data running on Huawei storage devices. In contrast, the other three vendors in the same equipment room suffered damage to a large number of their spinning disk drives or even to the storage devices. This did not just result in data loss but also week-long service interruptions while all of the damaged devices were replaced.

Huawei Quality Proven by the National Magnitude-9 Earthquake-resistant Certification

So, is it luck that allowed Huawei’s storage devices to perform so well? The answer is certainly no.

Huawei has been dedicated to work in the ICT field for 30 years and has accrued profound experience in device vibration protection. Last year, Huawei’s all-flash storage system obtained the Magnitude-9 Earthquake-resistant Certification of the China Telecommunication Technology Labs (CTTL). It is the only IT product series that has been awarded this CTTL certification.

Magnitude-9 Earthquake-resistant Report of Huawei storage systems

Authority of the “National Magnitude-9 Earthquake-resistant Certification” of the CTTL

The CTTL was founded on September 21, 1981, with the approval of the former General Administration of National Standards and the former Ministry of Post and Telecommunications of the People’s Republic of China. In China, all public communication equipment must pass CTTL performance tests before obtaining a network access permit. In addition, the CTTL is an authorized lab for international admission systems of the U.S. FCC, EU CE, Canada IC, Japan JATE, and Egypt NTRA. The earthquake-resistant quality inspection center of the CTTL is the only authority in China that provides seismic proof that main equipment of the public telecommunication networks can resist earthquakes. It is fundamental to prove that the equipment can endure earthquakes that are magnitude-7 and above.

The CTTL has professional seismic testing equipment, including world-leading three-dimensional six-degree-of-freedom (DOF) seismic simulation hydraulic shaking table, vertical and horizontal shock wave tables, a variable capacitance triaxial accelerometer, and precision data acquisition analyzers. These devices can accurately simulate a magnitude-9 earthquake in X, Y, and Z dimensions. The following figure shows a Huawei storage system undergoing a simulated magnitude-9 earthquake at the CTTL inspection center.

Magnitude-9 Earthquake-resistant Test

Would you like to see the tests for yourself? If so, you are in luck! Thanks to the professional support of the CTTL, we have moved the three-dimensional six-DOF seismic simulation hydraulic shaking table to the exhibition hall of the Huawei Chengdu Research Center. As of now, our all-flash storage system has gone through simulated magnitude-9 earthquake tests for a combined total of 2578 hours, and it is still running smoothly.

Many earthquake-prone countries and regions, such as Japan, have very stringent requirements for seismic resistance of IT devices due to the serious threat posed by earthquakes. In addition to earthquakes, abnormal equipment room environments (such as high air pressure), transportation and installation of the equipment, and internal sources of vibration (such as fans) can threaten the operation of equipment. Therefore, an effective seismic-resistant design is critical for the proper operation of the equipment.

 Huawei Storage’s Shockproof Technology

Since its research and development in 2002, Huawei storage has been refining its hardware architecture. In the early days, preventing vibration on mechanical hard disks was a core issue. In collaboration with the Data Storage Institute (DSI) of Singapore, Huawei has mastered the industry’s most advanced methods of finite element modeling (FEM), simulation, and testing and optimization. In addition Huawei has calibrated the model based on the data of tens of thousands of observed cases, and has built the most stable and reliable storage device in the industry.

Based on the FEM, Huawei storage devices provide end-to-end anti-seismic protection from cabinets to subracks and then to internal core components, fans, and disk enclosures. Each storage device that is delivered to customers has passed 30 drop, shock, and vibration tests, as well as spectrum tests for over 170 types of roads. This is what makes Huawei storage systems so reliable in different environments.

Highly Strengthened Cabinets

In terms of shockproof design, Huawei storage devices to be delivered in full cabinets have highly strengthened connections. This ensures that the cabinet can hold up to twice its weight without suffering irreversible deformation. In addition to this, if tension equal to 2.5 times the weight of the cabinet was applied from the front, back, left, and right of the cabinet, it would receive no permanent structural damage.

Three-dimensional Six-DOF Subracks

Subracks are fixed with three dimensions, six directions, and full degrees of freedom to ensure that the frame is incredibly strong. In addition, the design of guide pins and bayonet ensures that the boards and modules are tightly connected, and subracks, especially disk enclosures, are securely installed. The comprehensive anti-seismic capabilities of the cabinet meet rigorous magnitude-9 earthquake-resistant standards.

Shockproof Design of Internal Core Components

Fans are a primary source of internal vibration. Huawei leverages vibration isolation and absorption technologies in the three-layer vibration reduction solution through the fan and bracket, bracket and module structure, and module structure and chassis layer according to layers of vibration reduction. This reduces the vibration level of fan modules, minimizing the impact on the system. For hard drive handles of vibration-sensitive components, the external rigid spring plate is used to overcome the low frequency vibration, and the internal damping pad is designed to mitigate the high frequency vibration. This ensures protection from vibration and prolongs the service life of hard disk drives. The return rate of Huawei hard disk drives is 70% lower than the average rate in the industry.

Huawei’s Craftsmanship Spirit

In today’s world, data transformation leads to the extensive use of IT infrastructure. This means that we need to consider a more rigorous and complex device application scenarios than ever before.

In Japan, the country that records the most earthquakes in the world, Huawei storage has helped Yahoo Japan to achieve 24/7 business continuity.

In rough seas, Huawei all-flash storage ensures steady services onboard the German cruise liners AIDA and Viking for dozens of days at sea.

In harsh mining environments, Huawei all-flash storage enables the Australian mining group south32 to achieve round-the-clock operation and data analysis of hundreds of mining machines.

We are ceaselessly working to ensure continuous improvement and to meet customer needs, and has endeavored to achieve excellent storage performance and endurance in rigorous environments. This does not only refer to areas prone to disasters such as earthquakes, but also to environments such as those with extremely high/low temperatures, severe acid and alkali corrosion, and high and low pressure. We fully consider the environmental requirements of our customers and continue to develop and hone stable and reliable storage products. In addition, in terms of high performance, Huawei continually devotes R&D efforts to proprietary chips and the proprietary FlashLink^TM algorithm, driving it to continue to surpass itself and deliver storage products that have premium performance.

As the saying goes “Little by little, one travels far”, good products come from continuous efforts. Huawei has been forging ahead with the spirit of craftsmanship.

(Contributed by Zhao Yanling, IT Product Line)

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Source: Huawei Enterprise Blog
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