The article mentions in passing "high elevation (data servers in Mexico City)", but doesn't say why. Low air pressure because that makes cooling systems less efficient?
I kinda suspect more ambient radiation. Less atmosphere to catch stray particles, and the smaller gates are more susceptible. Smaller interactions cause random errors.
Anyway, far far outside the scope of my expertise. But that's my guess.
Could that actually effect the life of the chip though? Annoying to have your system crash, but that isn't a longevity problem by itself. Does a stray ray cause the gate to wear prematurely?
yeah. I've done a little bit (tiny, inconsequential, not an expert) with satellites.
When cosmic rays have enough energy they'll move atoms around. That's bad for gates. A 486, old big gates, doesn't hurt much. maybe you have to reboot every few days. Tiny little 2 atom gates, they're more delicate. think plastic vs glass glassware. With plastic you can have a few incidents and it'll still be a glass. with glass, it's a lot easier to chip an edge or shatter and not be usable anymore.
Again, not my area. But I suspect altitude is really bad for tiny systems because they lose so much "free" shielding.
I think you're right. I remember reading a 'bit flips can and do happen' war story about server crashes that only occurred at a client located at a high elevation.
NOAA has a supercomputing center in Boulder, CO that has produced some analysis of this, but if memory serves they also have to deal with some low intensity radiation from the Flatirons formation they're up by. Get enough computers with enough RAM and all bit flip sources start counting.
