Raise the temperature in your data center a few degrees and you can save money.  However, if the temperature in the data center causes the server fans to run too high, they will negate the saving from the chillers and air handlers.

Recommendations form industry groups for heating and air conditioning professionals recommends a temperature range from 77 to 80 degrees.  As the room temperature rises, the  chiller water set point can be raised as well.

The major take away: There are a number of factors that go into reducing energy costs in a data center.  At Metagyre our professionals focus on saving clients money in the daily operations of their data center through improved power utilization,  computing efficiencies, targeted air flow and the appropriate use of proven technologies.

Need help with your data center infrastructure? Contact theData Center Solutions experts at Metagyre, Inc. Data center management to data center consolidation putting business value in the data center.

Save Money With Higher Data Center Temperatures

One of the most quoted portions of the standard is the “Tiered Reliability”, which was intended as a means for determining specific data center needs required to lessen the time a data center was taken off-line.  The tier breakdown assists designers with a method to quantify certain aspects and to objectively compare one center to another.

Tier I – Basic Components

• single path for power and cooling with no redundant components (N)
• susceptible to disruptions from both planned maintenance activities and unplanned events
• may or may not have back up generator, UPS (uninterrupted power supply) or raised floor
• 99.671% availability – 28.8 hours (statistically) of annual downtime

Tier II – Redundant Maintainable

• single path for power and cooling with redundant components (N+1)
• less susceptible to planned and unplanned disruptions.  Planned infrastructure maintenance may require a processing shutdown
• includes generator, UPS, and raised floors
• 99.749% availability – 22.0 hours (statistically) of annual downtime

Tier III – Concurrently Tolerant

• multiple paths for power and cooling with only one active at any time (active/passive – N+1)
• planned infrastructure maintenance can be performed without disruption.  Unplanned events may cause disruptions
• includes raised floor, generator, UPS with each power and cooling path capable of carrying the full data center load
• 99.982% availability – 1.6 hours (statistically) of annual downtime

Tier IV – Fault Tolerant

• multiple active power and cooling distribution paths including redundant components (2(N+1) S+S) for example each path has UPS in an N+1 configuration
• can sustain planned maintenance activities and at least  one unplanned event without a critical impact on load
• includes raised floors, multiple generators, multiple UPS and other multiple distribution components
• 99.995% availability – 0.4 hours (statistically) of annual downtime

The standards went a long way to elevate the need for specific elements in the data center and the best practices for their usage.  Unfortunately, once the marketing spin took off, numerous collocation vendors began touting their facilities as a Tier III or Tier IV without regard for the full spectrum of component requirements or the processes supporting those components.  In addition the design standards cover other elements including:

• cable and fiber designs
• network distribution
• rack and cabinets layout
• space utilization and pathways
• air flow design

Many commercial collocation facilities claiming higher fault tolerance, achieve this mark by maintaining a lower power density requirement on their tenants driving up customer costs and reducing cabinet layout efficiencies. Even when the power plant supports high electrical draws, floor load ratings may limit the cabinet’s capacity.  Other times, best practices must be completely rethought, for example the best hot and cold aisle layout will fail to achieve design goals if the collocation facility locates the client in a cage space which does not support air flow management. Of course occasionally collocation customers themselves lower the reliability by failing to incorporate proper redundancy practices within their private suite or cage space.

Each business has unique up-time, cost, networking and processing density goals in mind when they establish a data center.  In order to reach those goals, a balance between requirements and design standards must be struck.  While the tiered data center may be an over used marketing myth, the ANSI/TIA-942-2005 provides a solid base template.  This template, along with skilled engineering and management practices can go a long way to facilitate a data center build out that delivers on technical design goals at an agreed upon business price point.

Need help with your data center infrastructure? Contact theData Center Solutions experts at Metagyre, Inc. Data center management to data center consolidation putting business value in the data center.

Collocation Facilities And The Myth Of The Tiered Data Center

• Physical inventory, floor layout and data center space measurements
• Invoices or internal charge backs for space, power, maintenance and Internet connectivity
• Current and planned WAN architecture
• Network bandwidth analysis reports
• Disaster recovery and business continuity requirements and plans
• Security, remote hands, and up-time requirements
• Equipment life cycle management policies and practices
• Planned capacity growth as well as up coming projects and equipment procurement budgets
• System architecture, data base counts and sizes, along with SAN and data storage requirements

The As Is analysis builds an understanding of the current state, identifies quick wins and surfaces hidden assumptions.  To Be activities allow assumptions to be changed as the team identifies best practices, validates the technology, verifies business requirements, checks for consistency and ensures the desired milestones are realistic. Working closely with client staff, the team will work to establish the To Be vision or desired state of the following:

• Center counts and location(s)
• Center infrastructure improvements and scaling options
• Optimized power, cabinet and floor layout
• Technical tools and architecture
• Production and operations support policies and procedure
• Networks and communication
• Server platforms and virtualization
• Data storage platforms and technology

Technology professionals need to maintain a balance between space, power and cooling against the increasing demands of doing more with less. An assessment is designed to help operations managers and senior leadership establish a current base line as well as a To Be vision.  Wheather that vision involves expansion, consolidation, relocation or simply optimizing the current situaion, a data center assessment will establish the road map for achiving that vision.

Need help with your data center infrastructure? Contact theData Center Solutions experts at Metagyre, Inc. Data center management to data center consolidation putting business value in the data center.

Data Center Management: Is An Assessment Needed?