First Look: Apple's iCloud data center site in Reno, Nevada
Apple has more in its pipeline than just new Macs and iOS products; the company is aggressively planning out and building new data centers to support iCloud and related iTunes features. Here's a look at the next major construction project planned at the new Reno Technology Park.
Seven years after locating its Braeburn Capital asset management subsidiary in Reno, Nevada (largely for tax purposes), Apple is planning an expansion of its footprint in the area for reasons beyond favorable tax rates.
Among the top factors that attracted Apple's attention to Reno were access to low cost power with solar and other renewable options; availability of high speed fibre optic conduits; limited risk of natural or man made disasters; and lower overall costs combined with, of course, tax incentives.
While Apple's Braeburn group was attracted by the state's lack of a corporate income tax, that factor is far less important to the location of Apple's data centers, which don't directly generate substantial revenues. Instead, low property and sales taxes were important.
The State of Nevada, Washoe County and the City of Reno collectively approved a series of tax abatements for Apple last summer, paving the way for Apple to begin construction. The incentives run for more than a decade, and portions of the tax reductions can be extended through 2042.
However, Reno isn't the only location in the US with low property and sales taxes, or economic conditions what will prompt state and local governments to offer tax incentives to attract the investment of a company like Apple.
Nebraska, Oregon and Wyoming have already adopted tax mitigation legislation specifically to attract data centers. Texas and Utah both offer greater tax incentive packages than Nevada does. But taxes aren't the only thing data center builders like Apple evaluate in picking a site.
A study that looked at a variety of competing data center construction and operational cost factors at a series of different potential sites performed by Nevada indicated that, even with tax incentives, Reno couldn't beat the overall cost advantages of a site in Oregon. Fortunately for Nevada, Apple wants to build multiple sites; the company is now building massive data centers in both Oregon and Nevada.
The new site, located just past a freeway scenic overlook east of Reno (view shown above), offers lots of relatively cheap land and has access to massive amounts of electrical power, thanks in part to a power plant (shown below) located adjacent the site.
Next to the plant is a solar field that's so large it appears to be a freeway in the panorama below, until you zoom in at greater detail (shown with inset detail below). There are also eight high capacity transmission lines to other power stations, which link to hydroelectric power plants in nearby states.
In addition to the existing, redundant power sources, the site also provides expansion room for additional solar and wind energy installations (the pano below depicts an area north of the freeway designated for solar field expansion), and has assess to high speed fibre optic data lines through a variety of carriers.
The cost of power in northern Nevada has been falling, and is now available in surplus, meaning that a data center located there can be guaranteed access to large amounts of affordable energy and can sign long term contracts to maintain a consistent supply of power at predictable prices.
A report by the Reno Gazette Journal cited site selection consultant Dennis Donovan as saying that data center clients "don't just want low cost electric power, but it also has to be reliable. THey also look at the source of that power and make sure that there is enough to support extra capacity without costs increasing dramatically it it's needed in the future."
Apple began with an initial data center site located in Maiden, North Carolina, which was first announced in July 2009 and became "fully operational" in late 2010.
That site went online just several months before Steve Jobs outlined Apple's plans for iCloud at its Worldwide Developer Conference in the summer of 2011. As a major new initiative, iCloud (and related iTunes services such as Match, as well as Apple's other cloud centric services that would follow it. including Siri and Maps) has a voracious appetite for data center capacity.
Apple recently began building a second data center site in Prineville, Oregon, near existing data center facilities operated by Facebook and in the same region as a data center built by Amazon.
Last summer, Apple announced it would also be building its third major data center at Reno Technology Park, investing over a billion dollars to make the project happen.
"We hope to build Apple's next data center in Reno to support Apple's iTunes Store, App Store, and incredibly popular iCloud services," the company's Kristin Huguet stated at the time.
The site itself is about a fifteen minute drive from Reno/Sparks (above, entering from with east with a view of the mountains near Lake Tahoe, the site of the first Winter Olympics to be held in the United States), neighboring cities that will also see additional expansion by Apple related to its operations of the new data center. Those plans will be detailed in a subsequent report.
Seven years after locating its Braeburn Capital asset management subsidiary in Reno, Nevada (largely for tax purposes), Apple is planning an expansion of its footprint in the area for reasons beyond favorable tax rates.
Among the top factors that attracted Apple's attention to Reno were access to low cost power with solar and other renewable options; availability of high speed fibre optic conduits; limited risk of natural or man made disasters; and lower overall costs combined with, of course, tax incentives.
While Apple's Braeburn group was attracted by the state's lack of a corporate income tax, that factor is far less important to the location of Apple's data centers, which don't directly generate substantial revenues. Instead, low property and sales taxes were important.
The State of Nevada, Washoe County and the City of Reno collectively approved a series of tax abatements for Apple last summer, paving the way for Apple to begin construction. The incentives run for more than a decade, and portions of the tax reductions can be extended through 2042.
However, Reno isn't the only location in the US with low property and sales taxes, or economic conditions what will prompt state and local governments to offer tax incentives to attract the investment of a company like Apple.
Nebraska, Oregon and Wyoming have already adopted tax mitigation legislation specifically to attract data centers. Texas and Utah both offer greater tax incentive packages than Nevada does. But taxes aren't the only thing data center builders like Apple evaluate in picking a site.
A study that looked at a variety of competing data center construction and operational cost factors at a series of different potential sites performed by Nevada indicated that, even with tax incentives, Reno couldn't beat the overall cost advantages of a site in Oregon. Fortunately for Nevada, Apple wants to build multiple sites; the company is now building massive data centers in both Oregon and Nevada.
Reno Technology Park
The new site, located just past a freeway scenic overlook east of Reno (view shown above), offers lots of relatively cheap land and has access to massive amounts of electrical power, thanks in part to a power plant (shown below) located adjacent the site.
Next to the plant is a solar field that's so large it appears to be a freeway in the panorama below, until you zoom in at greater detail (shown with inset detail below). There are also eight high capacity transmission lines to other power stations, which link to hydroelectric power plants in nearby states.
In addition to the existing, redundant power sources, the site also provides expansion room for additional solar and wind energy installations (the pano below depicts an area north of the freeway designated for solar field expansion), and has assess to high speed fibre optic data lines through a variety of carriers.
The cost of power in northern Nevada has been falling, and is now available in surplus, meaning that a data center located there can be guaranteed access to large amounts of affordable energy and can sign long term contracts to maintain a consistent supply of power at predictable prices.
A report by the Reno Gazette Journal cited site selection consultant Dennis Donovan as saying that data center clients "don't just want low cost electric power, but it also has to be reliable. THey also look at the source of that power and make sure that there is enough to support extra capacity without costs increasing dramatically it it's needed in the future."
Apple's third major US data center
After initiating plans to develop Reno Technology Park, Unique Infrastructure Group immediately began efforts to recruit potential data center clients to its new site, including Apple. As it turns out, the Reno site will be Apple's third major US data center.Apple began with an initial data center site located in Maiden, North Carolina, which was first announced in July 2009 and became "fully operational" in late 2010.
That site went online just several months before Steve Jobs outlined Apple's plans for iCloud at its Worldwide Developer Conference in the summer of 2011. As a major new initiative, iCloud (and related iTunes services such as Match, as well as Apple's other cloud centric services that would follow it. including Siri and Maps) has a voracious appetite for data center capacity.
Apple recently began building a second data center site in Prineville, Oregon, near existing data center facilities operated by Facebook and in the same region as a data center built by Amazon.
Last summer, Apple announced it would also be building its third major data center at Reno Technology Park, investing over a billion dollars to make the project happen.
"We hope to build Apple's next data center in Reno to support Apple's iTunes Store, App Store, and incredibly popular iCloud services," the company's Kristin Huguet stated at the time.
The site itself is about a fifteen minute drive from Reno/Sparks (above, entering from with east with a view of the mountains near Lake Tahoe, the site of the first Winter Olympics to be held in the United States), neighboring cities that will also see additional expansion by Apple related to its operations of the new data center. Those plans will be detailed in a subsequent report.
Comments
Compared to Cupertino, which lies on an active fault, Reno is pretty low in seismic activity if you consult the USGS.gov site
Do to the molten core and tectonic plates all of Earth is an earthquake zone.
(dot)Comstock Lode?
Perhaps to support a streaming service? Or the rumored Apple TV ( which would require a lot of capacity)?
But by all means run articles on hedge fund managers whining in efforts to drive the stock down, instead of reporting on the half dozen or so data centers being built around the globe, and much more going on behind the scenes where billions from Apple is currently being allocated for future growth.
Should have built a couple of this from the start. Shouldn't wait this long.
One thing that I don't like about iCloud is that people who own multiple iOS devices get penalized for owning so many devices.
If ten different people buys one iPad each, then every person will get 5 GB of iCloud storage space, costing Apple 50 GB of combined space.
If one person buys ten iPads, then that person will only get 5 GB to share between all of their devices, costing Apple 5 GB of combined space.
People who own many devices should get rewarded, not penalized. 5 GB is not enough space when you have multiple iOS devices. And no, I am not the least bit interested in paying extra for additional storage, purely out of principle. I don't care if it costs 99 cents per year.
Quote:
Originally Posted by matrix07
Should have built a couple of this from the start. Shouldn't wait this long.
Prices was high for data centers without water and solar energy plants
I certainly understand what you're saying and it would be great if authenticated devices could be tied to additional storage but there is some complexity with such a setup. You need to make sure it can't be spoofed so people can't get extra storage without buying a device, and you'd have to limit it one additional iCloud account which would probably mean there would have to be a untether a device and then allow it to be tethered to another.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SolipsismX
I certainly understand what you're saying and it would be great if authenticated devices could be tied to additional storage but there is some complexity with such a setup. You need to make sure it can't be spoofed so people can't get extra storage without buying a device, and you'd have to limit it one additional iCloud account which would probably mean there would have to be a untether a device and then allow it to be tethered to another.
I don't know anything about the technical issues behind it, but surely it can't be all that complicated I imagine.
Whenever I open up iTunes, a list of iOS devices that I own are located via WIFI and they pop up as separate devices, so Apple surely knows how many devices I own and how many are connected to my Apple ID, don't they?
If there is some vast complexity or technical hurdles behind this limitation, then ok, I might understand that, but if it's simply a business decision that was made, then I don't agree with that.
1) That isn't Apple knowing anything. That's iTunes seeing USB and WiFi connected iDevices.
2) Using your scenario every time a new iDevice UDID pops in iTunes you want to get additional storage on iCloud so that means iTunes is then sending that data to iCloud to be logged as a new device. Since we're only talking about simple identification as HW it would be difficult to spoof many fake WiFI or USB connected devices that don't exist. So should these people get additional storage or do you no longer care about potential thieves because you want something?
3) The viable option is by using iCloud accounts that require the username and password authentication but then you have the issues after the fact with how the data will be utilized. If you delete an iCloud account from a device does it instantly drop your total data amount which could affect your current storage? You can't have it remove all backups for that device to alleviate the usage because you might be restoring the device for one of various reasons. Can you log your iCloud account as inactive on your grandmother's iPad because you know she won't ever use that storage for anything? If you have multiple iCloud accounts tied to devices which one gets the extra storage or do all accounts get the extra storage which means a family could set up on each other's devices to maximize storage?
4) These aren't insurmountable issues but they also aren't trivial. Apple doesn't like to jump in head first like MS and Google with piss poor planning to see what works and change it up after a seriously security breach or logistical nightmare has been found. They could do that but they usually like to measure twice and cut once, as the saying goes. Haven't they had enough issues figuring out cloud services over the years that poorly contrived features a negative thing to expect?
5) In a few months all those people with paid MobileMe accounts will expire and that 25GB will drop. I wouldn't be surprised if they up everyone's storage to at least 10GB with the next iPhone release simply because of the multi-device ownership. Wouldn't that just be easier than using iCloud accounts and CC purchases with devices connected to iTunes that report home to Apple's servers as a way of making sure a typical allotment of iDevices backs up to iCloud?
Quote:
Originally Posted by EricTheHalfBee
What's more interesting to me is the fact Apple is building two more data centres. That's a huge upgrade to their current system and goes far beyond just having redundancy.
Perhaps to support a streaming service? Or the rumored Apple TV ( which would require a lot of capacity)?
How do you know this goes beyond redundancy?
Quote:
Originally Posted by SolipsismX
1) That isn't Apple knowing anything. That's iTunes seeing USB and WiFi connected iDevices.
2) Using your scenario every time a new iDevice UDID pops in iTunes you want to get additional storage on iCloud so that means iTunes is then sending that data to iCloud to be logged as a new device. Since we're only talking about simple identification as HW it would be difficult to spoof many fake WiFI or USB connected devices that don't exist. So should these people get additional storage or do you no longer care about potential thieves because you want something?
3) The viable option is by using iCloud accounts that require the username and password authentication but then you have the issues after the fact with how the data will be utilized. If you delete an iCloud account from a device does it instantly drop your total data amount which could affect your current storage? You can't have it remove all backups for that device to alleviate the usage because you might be restoring the device for one of various reasons. Can you log your iCloud account as inactive on your grandmother's iPad because you know she won't ever use that storage for anything? If you have multiple iCloud accounts tied to devices which one gets the extra storage or do all accounts get the extra storage which means a family could set up on each other's devices to maximize storage?
4) These aren't insurmountable issues but they also aren't trivial. Apple doesn't like to jump in head first like MS and Google with piss poor planning to see what works and change it up after a seriously security breach or logistical nightmare has been found. They could do that but they usually like to measure twice and cut once, as the saying goes. Haven't they had enough issues figuring out cloud services over the years that poorly contrived features a negative thing to expect?
5) In a few months all those people with paid MobileMe accounts will expire and that 25GB will drop. I wouldn't be surprised if they up everyone's storage to at least 10GB with the next iPhone release simply because of the multi-device ownership. Wouldn't that just be easier than using iCloud accounts and CC purchases with devices connected to iTunes that report home to Apple's servers as a way of making sure a typical allotment of iDevices backs up to iCloud?
Of course I don't want Apple to be implementing anything if it's easy for thieves to spoof devices or if the implementation were to be rushed or done half way. But I do expect Apple to somehow solve this issue in the future.
Quote:
Originally Posted by joekewe
It's also next door to Nevada's first legal (and largest) brothel - Mustang Ranch. And close to the I-80 turn-off for Burning Man. Yee haw.
Didn't know someone here is a frequent visitor.