This weblog was written in collaboration with the Microsoft Surface and Azure group. It describes how we used Azure high-performance computing (HPC) to avoid wasting time, prices, and revolutionized our product design piece of producing our Microsoft Surface merchandise.
The Microsoft Surface group exists to create iconic end-to-end experiences throughout {hardware}, software program, and companies that individuals love to make use of every single day. We consider that merchandise are a mirrored image of the individuals who construct them, and that the correct instruments and infrastructure can complement the expertise and fervour of designers and engineers to ship progressive merchandise. Product stage simulation fashions are routinely utilized in day-to-day resolution making on design, reliability, and product options. The group can be on a multi-year journey to ship differentiated merchandise in a extremely environment friendly method. Microsoft Azure HPC performs a significant function in enabling this imaginative and prescient. Below is an account of how we have been in a position to do extra with much less by leveraging the facility of simulation and Azure HPC.
Surface gadgets growth on Microsoft Azure
I’m a Principal Engineer at Microsoft and a structural analyst. I’ve been a heavy consumer of Azure HPC and an early adopter of Azure A8 and A9 digital machines. In 2015, with the assistance of our Surface IT group, we deployed and solved many points with Abaqus (a Finite Element Analysis (FEA) software program) implementation in Azure HPC. By 2016, product stage structural simulations for Surface Pro 4 and the unique Surface laptop computer had absolutely migrated to Azure HPC from on-premises servers. Large fashions with tens of millions of levels of freedom turned routine and simply solved on Azure HPC. This early use of simulations enabled drawback fixing for design engineers tasked with robustness and reliability metrics. Usage grew together with product line progress. Along with my colleagues Pritul Shah, Senior Director of a cross product engineering group, and Jarkko Sihvonen, Senior Engineer of the IT Infrastructure and Services group, we collaborated to scale up structural simulation footprint in our group. The imaginative and prescient to construct a world simulation group meant entry to computing servers in Western North America and Southeast Asia which was simply deployed by the Surface IT and Azure HPC groups.
Product growth: Surface laptop computer
The availability of Azure HPC for structural simulations utilizing Abaqus helped make this a major growth device for product design. Design ideas created in digital computer-aided design (CAD) methods are translated into FEA mannequin intimately. These are true digital prototypes and represent all main subsystems within the gadget. The analyst can use FEA fashions to impose totally different check and reliability situations in a digital atmosphere and decide feasibility. In a number of days, lots of of simulations are executed to guage numerous design concepts and options to make the gadget sturdy. Subsequently, the chosen design turns into a protype after which topic to rigorous testing for real-world use situations. There are a number of suggestions loops constructed into our engineering course of to match precise exams and FEA outcomes for mannequin validation.
In the primary graphics depicted above, a digital prototype (FEA mannequin) laptop computer gadget is set-up to drop on its nook to the ground. This fashions the real-world bodily testing that’s performed in our Reliability Engineering labs. The impression velocity for a given top is the preliminary situation for the dynamic simulation. The dynamic drop simulation is executed on lots of of cores of an Azure HPC cluster utilizing Abaqus solver. We used the Abaqus and Explicit solver which is understood for its sturdy and correct resolution for high-speed, nonlinear, dynamic occasions similar to shopper electronics drop testing and automotive crashworthiness. These solvers are optimized particularly for Azure HPC clusters and allow scaling to 1000’s of cores for quick throughputs. The simulation jobs full in a matter of some hours on these optimized Azure HPC servers as a substitute of the times it used to take beforehand. The outcomes are reviewed by the analysts and stress ranges are checked towards materials limits. Design groups and analysts then evaluate the studies and make design updates. This cycle continues in very fast loops because the Azure HPC servers allow quick turnaround for critiques.
The second graphic depicts an instance of the hinge within the gadget that was optimized for power. The group was in a position to visualize the impression induced movement and stress ranges of the hinge inside components from the simulation. This enabled us to isolate the primary problem and make the correct design enhancements. This perception helped redesign the hinge meeting to trigger decrease stress ranges. Significant time was saved within the design course of as just one iteration was wanted for achievement. Tooling, bodily prototyping, and testing prices have been additionally saved.
Presently, all the Microsoft Surface product line makes use of this strategy of validating design with digital prototypes (FEA fashions) run on Azure HPC clusters. Thousands of simulation jobs are executed routinely in a matter of weeks to allow cutting-edge designs which have very excessive reliability and buyer satisfaction.
What’s subsequent
The group is now targeted on deploying extra scalable simulation and Azure HPC useful resource for multi-disciplinary groups and for multi-physics modeling. There is a large alternative to allow machine studying and AI in product creation. Azure HPC and the partnerships inside Microsoft organizations might be leveraged to drive massive scale improvements at a fast velocity. We are additionally persevering with this digital transformation journey with mannequin primarily based methods engineering (MBSE) with the V4 Institute. World-class organizations trying to do extra with much less and on a quest for scaling digital simulations will enormously profit from collaborating with Azure.
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