7 ms·

Even is the AI bubble does not pops, your prediction about those servers being available on ebay in 10 years will likely be true, because some datacenters will

Even is the AI bubble does not pops, your prediction about those servers being available on ebay in 10 years will likely be true, because some datacenters will simply upgrade their hardware and resell their old ones to third parties.

belter 1y ago
Except their insane electricity demands will still be the same, meaning nobody will buy them. You have plenty of SPARC servers on Ebay.
- cicloid 1y ago
  There is also a community of users known for not making sane financial decisions and keeping older technologies working in their basements.
  - dijit 1y ago
    But we are few, and fewer still who will go for high power consumption devices with esoteric cooling requirements that generate a lot of noise.
mattmanser 1y ago
Someone's take on AI was that we're collectively investing billions in data centers that will be utterly worthless in 10 years. Unlike the investments in railways or telephone cables or roads or any other sort of architecture, this investment has a very short lifespan. Their point was that whatever your take on AI, the present investment in data centres is a ridiculous waste and will always end up as a huge net loss compared to most other investments our societies could spend it on. Maybe we'll invent AGI and he'll be proven wrong as they'll pay back themselves many times over, but I suspect they'll ultimately be proved right and it'll all end up as land fill.
- mensetmanusman 1y ago
  Utterly? Moores law per power requirement is dead, lower power units can run electric heating for small towns!
- dortlick 1y ago
  Sure, but what about the collective investment in smartphones, digital cameras, laptops, even cars. Not much modern technology is useful and practical after 10 years, let alone 20. AI is probably moving a little faster than normal, but technology depreciation is not limited to AI.
- jonplackett 1y ago
  They probably are right, but a counter argument could be how people thought going to the moon was pointless and insanely expensive, but the technology to put stuff in space and have GPS and comms satellites probably paid that back 100x
  - DaiPlusPlus 1y ago
    I don’t mean to invalidate your point (about genuine value arising from innovations originating from the Apollo program), but GPS and comms satellites (and heck, the Internet) are all products of nuclear weapons programs rather than civilian space exploration programs (ditto the Space Shuttle, and I could go on…).
    - CamperBob2 1y ago
      Yes, and no. The people working on GPS paid very close attention to the papers from JPL researchers describing their timing and ranging techniques for both Apollo and deep-space probes. There was more cross-pollination than meets the eye.
  - vl 1y ago
    Reality is that we don’t know how much of a trope this statement is. I think we would get all this technology without going to the moon or Space Shuttle program. GPS, for example, was developed for military applications initially.
potatolicious 1y ago
Would anybody buy the hardware though? Sure, datacenters will get rid of the hardware - but only because it's no longer commercially profitable run them, presumably because compute demands have eclipsed their abilities. It's kind of like buying a used GeForce 980Ti in 2025. Would anyone buy them and run them besides out of nostalgia or curiosity? Just the power draw makes them uneconomical to run. Much more likely every single H100 that exists today becomes e-waste in a few years. If you have need for H100-level compute you'd be able to buy it in the form of new hardware for way less money and consuming way less power. For example if you actually wanted 980Ti-level compute in a desktop today you can just buy a RTX5050, which is ~50% faster, consumes half the power, and can be had for $250 brand new. Oh, and is well-supported by modern software stacks.
- CBarkleyU 1y ago
  Off topic, but I bought my (still in active use) 980ti literally 9 years ago for that price. I know, I know, inflation and stuff, but I really expected more than 50% bang for my buck after 9 whole years…
- nucleardog 1y ago
  > Sure, datacenters will get rid of the hardware - but only because it's no longer commercially profitable run them, presumably because compute demands have eclipsed their abilities. I think the existence of a pretty large secondary market for enterprise servers and such kind of shows that this won't be the case. Sure, if you're AWS and what you're selling _is_ raw compute, then couple generation old hardware may not be sufficiently profitable for you anymore... but there are a lot of other places that hardware could be applied to with different requirements or higher margins where it may still be. Even if they're only running models a generation or two out of date, there are a lot of use cases today, with today's models, that will continue to work fine going forward. And that's assuming it doesn't get replaced for some other reason that only applies when you're trying to sell compute at scale. A small uptick in the failure rate may make a big dent at OpenAI but not for a company that's only running 8 cards in a rack somewhere and has a few spares on hand. A small increase in energy efficiency might offset the capital outlay to upgrade at OpenAI, but not for the company that's only running 8 cards. I think there's still plenty of room in the market in places where running inference "at cost" would be profitable that are largely untapped right now because we haven't had a bunch of this hardware hit the market at a lower cost yet.
DecentShoes 1y ago
This seems likely. Blizzard even sold off old World of Warcraft servers. You can still get them on ebay

belter 1y ago

Except their insane electricity demands will still be the same, meaning nobody will buy them. You have plenty of SPARC servers on Ebay.

cicloid 1y ago
There is also a community of users known for not making sane financial decisions and keeping older technologies working in their basements.
- dijit 1y ago
  But we are few, and fewer still who will go for high power consumption devices with esoteric cooling requirements that generate a lot of noise.

mattmanser 1y ago

Someone's take on AI was that we're collectively investing billions in data centers that will be utterly worthless in 10 years. Unlike the investments in railways or telephone cables or roads or any other sort of architecture, this investment has a very short lifespan. Their point was that whatever your take on AI, the present investment in data centres is a ridiculous waste and will always end up as a huge net loss compared to most other investments our societies could spend it on. Maybe we'll invent AGI and he'll be proven wrong as they'll pay back themselves many times over, but I suspect they'll ultimately be proved right and it'll all end up as land fill.

mensetmanusman 1y ago
Utterly? Moores law per power requirement is dead, lower power units can run electric heating for small towns!
dortlick 1y ago
Sure, but what about the collective investment in smartphones, digital cameras, laptops, even cars. Not much modern technology is useful and practical after 10 years, let alone 20. AI is probably moving a little faster than normal, but technology depreciation is not limited to AI.
jonplackett 1y ago
They probably are right, but a counter argument could be how people thought going to the moon was pointless and insanely expensive, but the technology to put stuff in space and have GPS and comms satellites probably paid that back 100x
- DaiPlusPlus 1y ago
  I don’t mean to invalidate your point (about genuine value arising from innovations originating from the Apollo program), but GPS and comms satellites (and heck, the Internet) are all products of nuclear weapons programs rather than civilian space exploration programs (ditto the Space Shuttle, and I could go on…).
  - CamperBob2 1y ago
    Yes, and no. The people working on GPS paid very close attention to the papers from JPL researchers describing their timing and ranging techniques for both Apollo and deep-space probes. There was more cross-pollination than meets the eye.
- vl 1y ago
  Reality is that we don’t know how much of a trope this statement is. I think we would get all this technology without going to the moon or Space Shuttle program. GPS, for example, was developed for military applications initially.

potatolicious 1y ago

Would anybody buy the hardware though? Sure, datacenters will get rid of the hardware - but only because it's no longer commercially profitable run them, presumably because compute demands have eclipsed their abilities. It's kind of like buying a used GeForce 980Ti in 2025. Would anyone buy them and run them besides out of nostalgia or curiosity? Just the power draw makes them uneconomical to run. Much more likely every single H100 that exists today becomes e-waste in a few years. If you have need for H100-level compute you'd be able to buy it in the form of new hardware for way less money and consuming way less power. For example if you actually wanted 980Ti-level compute in a desktop today you can just buy a RTX5050, which is ~50% faster, consumes half the power, and can be had for $250 brand new. Oh, and is well-supported by modern software stacks.

CBarkleyU 1y ago
Off topic, but I bought my (still in active use) 980ti literally 9 years ago for that price. I know, I know, inflation and stuff, but I really expected more than 50% bang for my buck after 9 whole years…
nucleardog 1y ago
> Sure, datacenters will get rid of the hardware - but only because it's no longer commercially profitable run them, presumably because compute demands have eclipsed their abilities. I think the existence of a pretty large secondary market for enterprise servers and such kind of shows that this won't be the case. Sure, if you're AWS and what you're selling _is_ raw compute, then couple generation old hardware may not be sufficiently profitable for you anymore... but there are a lot of other places that hardware could be applied to with different requirements or higher margins where it may still be. Even if they're only running models a generation or two out of date, there are a lot of use cases today, with today's models, that will continue to work fine going forward. And that's assuming it doesn't get replaced for some other reason that only applies when you're trying to sell compute at scale. A small uptick in the failure rate may make a big dent at OpenAI but not for a company that's only running 8 cards in a rack somewhere and has a few spares on hand. A small increase in energy efficiency might offset the capital outlay to upgrade at OpenAI, but not for the company that's only running 8 cards. I think there's still plenty of room in the market in places where running inference "at cost" would be profitable that are largely untapped right now because we haven't had a bunch of this hardware hit the market at a lower cost yet.

DecentShoes 1y ago

This seems likely. Blizzard even sold off old World of Warcraft servers. You can still get them on ebay