The Ohio Supercomputer Center ensures system resilience through robust infrastructure provisions in partnership with the State of Ohio Computer Center.
To ensure ongoing reliability in the event of adverse circumstances, the Ohio Supercomputer Center (OSC) houses its high performance computing clusters at the State of Ohio Computer Center (SOCC). The state-of-the-art, $63 million SOCC provides shared security, climate control and fully redundant electrical and mechanical support systems for a number of Ohio government agencies.
Facility and Systems
Located on The Ohio State University's west campus within walking distance of the OSC offices, the SOCC is the largest state-owned facility of its kind in the Midwest. The 360,000 square-foot building includes 225,000 square feet of raised-floor computer room. OSC currently occupies approximately 12,000 square feet in the SOCC with total usable power capacity of approximately 1,200 kilowatts. Reliable utility backup systems were designed to keep all computers and support systems online at all times.
Power
In the event of a power failure, battery-based Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) equipment is capable of powering the clusters for up to of 20 minutes while six standby generators come online. The generators have a total current capacity of 11,750 kilowatts and store enough fuel to run the facility at full capacity for five days.
Network
The State of Ohio Computer Center connects directly to the Ohio Academic Resources Network (OARnet), Ohio's ultra-fast fiber optic network backbone serving state and local government agencies, higher education institutions, K-12 schools and ITCs, public broadcasters and health care organizations throughout Ohio. OARnet delivers premier reliability thanks to a comprehensive monitoring operation and security protocols such as DDoS mitigation, network peering and fully redundant network rings.
Data Backups
In order to minimize the risk of data loss, client data stored on OSC’s home and project data systems are kept on hard drives configured in RAID arrays, and also backed up daily to robotic tape drives.
