For the better part of the last two decades, data center observers have been predicting increases in average rack density regardless of the fact that they have continuously been proven wrong. Yet, there are reasons to believe that those long-anticipated increases are headed for the racks now.
Many are probably thinking: “I’ve heard this before.” And that’s true. It wouldn’t take much time on Google to find examples of failed forecasts predicting higher rack densities. It hasn’t happened for a number of reasons, and some of those barriers still exist. But change follows demand, and demand for compute is, well … changing.