Hot-Swapping Analysis and Implementation of Series-Stacked Server Power Delivery Architectures

Enver Candan, Derek Heeger, Pradeep S. Shenoy, Robert C.N. Pilawa-Podgurski

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Current data center power delivery architectures consist of many cascaded power conversion stages, where the system-level power conversion efficiency is reduced each time the power is processed through the individual stages. Recently, series-stacked power delivery architectures have shown how the overall power conversion can be reduced through architectural changes, reporting above 99% system-level power conversion efficiencies for data centers. In this paper, we contribute to the development of the series-stacked power delivery architectures by addressing the important hot-swapping challenge, without sacrificing the high power conversion efficiency. We analyze the hot-swapped operation of the series-stacked architecture, and experimentally validate it on a testbed that includes four series-connected 12 V, 120 W servers and four custom-designed differential converters with associated circuitry for hot-swapping. The results show that continuous operation of the series-stacked servers can be maintained while a server is hot-swapped without a significant reduction in the high power conversion efficiency.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article number7782790
Pages (from-to)8071-8088
Number of pages18
JournalIEEE Transactions on Power Electronics
Volume32
Issue number10
DOIs
StatePublished - Oct 2017

Keywords

  • Bidirectional power flow
  • dc-dc power converters
  • differential power processing
  • high efficiency data center power delivery
  • hot-swapping

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Electrical and Electronic Engineering

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