history Archives

Dense server racks beside a smaller inference test rack and engineer.

Railroads, Fiber and Now AI: What Past Infrastructure Booms Can and Cannot Teach

Big infrastructure build-outs have often seen enthusiasm run ahead of returns. Here is a measured look at historical parallels and their limits.

Software engineer working beside a small server test bench.

Explainers2 months ago

A Short History of the Data Center, From Mainframe Rooms to AI Campuses

Data centers grew from climate-controlled computer rooms into global infrastructure. Here is a brief, plain-English history of how the industry evolved.

Explainers3 months ago

Why Hard Drives Still Matter in the Age of Flash

Flash storage is faster, yet spinning hard drives still hold a huge share of the world's data. Here is a short history of the hard drive...

Technician inspecting an edge-computing cabinet beside a warehouse conveyor.

Networking4 months ago

A Brief History of Ethernet, From an Office Experiment to AI Superclusters

Ethernet started as a way to connect computers in one research lab. Fifty years later, it links data centers and AI clusters. Here is how it...

Network switching package with optical fiber ribbons on an engineering workbench.

Networking5 months ago

A Short History of Subsea Cables, From Telegraph Wire to Fiber Optics

The cables on the ocean floor carry the overwhelming majority of intercontinental data. Their story starts with Victorian telegraphs and runs straight through to the AI...

Explainers5 months ago

The Invention of the Integrated Circuit and Why It Still Matters

In the late 1950s, two engineers independently figured out how to build a whole circuit on one piece of material. Here is how the integrated circuit...

Liquid-Cooling Leak Detection and Reliability

Explainers5 months ago

From Video Games to AI: A Short History of the GPU

The graphics processor was built to render games, not to train neural networks. Here is how the GPU evolved into the engine of modern AI.

Compute & Silicon6 months ago

Dennard Scaling: The Forgotten Rule That Shaped Modern Chips

Moore's Law gets the fame, but Dennard scaling explained why shrinking transistors once made chips both faster and cooler. Its end changed chip design.

Explainers6 months ago

What Moore’s Law Actually Said, and What It Didn’t

Moore's Law is quoted constantly and often misunderstood. Here is the original observation, how it changed and what it means for AI hardware today.

AI Data-Center Power: Why Compute Is Becoming an Energy Problem

Explainers7 months ago

A Short History of Data Center Cooling, From Mainframes to AI Clusters

Data center cooling has swung from water to air and back toward liquid. A brief history of how the industry got here.

Explainers9 months ago

Edison, Westinghouse and the War of the Currents

The grid we rely on today was shaped by a nineteenth-century contest between direct and alternating current. Here is the history and why it still echoes...