Little-Miss Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 I dont imagine there is anything set in stone, but what's the minimum size of a server room? Im not thinking legally, thinking more circulation and what not. This is 2 servers, 1 imimic and 2 UPS's. Link2ICT guy nearly fell over when he felt the heat of my cupboard. My buildings manager has her thinking cap on at the moment trying to think if there is a corner somewhere we can turn into a little room...
Sylv3r Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Hi Little-Miss I take it your server room currently does not have aircon. I wonder if this would be the easier solution although it does not give you much flexibility for the future.
Little-Miss Posted June 9, 2009 Author Posted June 9, 2009 There is physically no room in there for air con! Some idiot suggested the servers were moved in there before i arrived. It's basically a cupboard under the stairs thats in the ICT Suite that contains our master cab (!) and the servers, no room for anything else. BUT...That maybe something to think about if i put the back where they came from. That was a narrow store room, but it has an external wall. May suggest that tomorrow!
Michael Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 It's a mixed bag really. There aren't really any requirements as such for a server room, however if you're full time (and by the sounds of things you are), you are entitled to a comfortable working environment just like anyone else. Remember you don't need to be physically located in the same area as your servers. This is where Remote Desktop is extremely useful If the room is extremely warm then some form of air conditioning is recommended. Whatever you do though, don't buy a cheap portable unit that requires a tank emptying. Get something properly wall mounted which pumps any water outside (directly onto a flat roof for example).
Little-Miss Posted June 9, 2009 Author Posted June 9, 2009 Know any good air conditioning companies Mikey (lol sorry!) Or anybody in the west midlands?
Michael Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 You could look at recommended Birmingham suppliers, or take a look in Yellow pages. Be sure to get a few quotes as in my experience it varies considerably
TNE Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Know any good air conditioning companies Mikey (lol sorry!) Or anybody in the west midlands? There is a company moving into the unit next door to us in Birmingham. I cant recommend them as I don't know them but they are local and if you want the number ill get it tomorrow or ask them to give you a call.
jamin100 Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 My server room / office is about the size of a small bedroom. Its got 4 servers, wall mounted coms cab, me & my junk and aircon. It was really cheap to kit out just cost a bit to get all the network cables re-routed to the new room. Your welcome to come and see it if you want.
SYNACK Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 No distinct answer as such but the more volure the better. This means that there is more air to work with and more time if the AC fails. There meeds to be enough room to set up a good air current so If your servers are rack mounted or on a table (high enough to avoid water) ther is enough space above them for the ho air to rise and be dealt with (1 meter absolute minimum but the higher the better). Depending on teh enviroment you may also want a well sealed door so that all of the nice cold air does not leak into the hallway instead of cooling the servers. You do not want your servers directly under the AC incase it freezes up and starts raining water on them either. The AC peopel will need room to get to the unit for servicing/repair aswell which adds the need for a bit more space also. From a practical standpoint the room must be big enough to fit the physical servers comfortably - there must be enough room to safely pick them up and possibly turn them over/do work on them unless they are to be moved every time anything physical needs to be done on them. With many servers there are actual hard limits on how close their fans can be to a wall etc and you want the room to get behind them and possibly depending on the server swap out a hotswap PSU or reconnect cables. A lot of this stuff is kind of dictated by work safety stuff as they frown on people busting their backs due to lifting in a confined space or having to squeeze beside a server to get to some cables while it is still running.
PEO Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 the heat must be of the scale!! I would play the data integrety card
Little-Miss Posted June 9, 2009 Author Posted June 9, 2009 I plan to if we're going to fork out on a Air con unit....basically, its not coming out of my budget!! I'd kill for a rack mounted setup right now. I've never thought about the fact that i cant get to the backs of them easily, i'm just one of those daft people that grins and bears it but thats a damn good point! I shouldnt have to!
dhicks Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 what's the minimum size of a server room? What was the name of that company who were advertising an all-in-one air-conditioned cabinet solution? It was designed to look like a traditional office cupboard rather than A Server Rack and came complete with air-conditioning (I think). Kept sound in too, it was meant for small offices that don't have separate space to put a traditional style server cabinet and don't want their offices looking (or sounding) like a server room. They ran full-page back-of-magazine ads on Computing or something for months, I think. -- David Hicks
DMcCoy Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 As synack mentioned for a server room with a rack, you can need quite a big room. When you start putting really big things in (blade centres, 5000KV UPS+) you will ideally need: Room to stand behind rack - Rack - Room for extended rail - Room for server infront of Rails. Potentially if it's a difficult item to fit, you could well need 4 meters or so of depth
Little-Miss Posted June 9, 2009 Author Posted June 9, 2009 Woah, Rack right out the window then!! dhicks do try to remember!!! Bet it's expensive, but i'd like a look!
crc-ict Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 What was the name of that company who were advertising an all-in-one air-conditioned cabinet solution? It was designed to look like a traditional office cupboard rather than A Server Rack and came complete with air-conditioning (I think). Kept sound in too, it was meant for small offices that don't have separate space to put a traditional style server cabinet and don't want their offices looking (or sounding) like a server room. They ran full-page back-of-magazine ads on Computing or something for months, I think. dhicks do try to remember!!! Bet it's expensive, but i'd like a look! I'd hazard a guess that it was probably Kell Systems Kell Systems - Acoustic Server Cabinets They look good, but they also look expensive - I always think the lack of any price info on a website is ominous!! Hope this helps though. 2
DMcCoy Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Woah, Rack right out the window then!! dhicks do try to remember!!! Bet it's expensive, but i'd like a look! If you are using smaller items then you can get away with rack + rails, so 2 meters. If you are using a rack with non rack servers (such as on a rack shelf instead, or non rail mounted servers then you won't need as much. Full depth racks on their own are getting on for 1.2m without the front/rear doors open.
witch Posted June 10, 2009 Posted June 10, 2009 I've got a very small room with a fan on a wall that leads into a corridor. Provided I leave it on all the time it is OK. We looked into AirCon but the cost was prohibitive to us. Better than my old school though - they finally gave me a fan which came on with the light switch - so if the light wasn't on..eg at night, holidays or weekends, there was no cooling!!
Duke Posted June 10, 2009 Posted June 10, 2009 I'm in the process of doing some server room designs at the moment. I've luckily got a bit of space to play with in the new location but the old location that's going to be used as a disaster recovery site is being cut in size. My question - Does anyone know how much room you should have in front and behind a rack for both maintenance and airflow/cooling? I've looked around and I can't find any definitive figures anywhere besides what server manufacturers recommend for maintenance access. Presumably if I have 1000mm deep racks then I'm going to need 800mm-1000mm plus room for me to stand in front of the rack for maintenance. However, if I have a full 42U rack of server and storage, what's the recommended space around the rack for airflow? We have fairly good aircon, but I'm concerned management will try to cut the room in the DR site and force a rack to end up against a wall. Any thoughts? Cheers, Chris
pete Posted June 10, 2009 Posted June 10, 2009 (edited) You could ask in the Server Room forum at Ars (The Server Room - Forum Powered by Eve For Enterprise). Be prepared to be insanely jealous if you look at the datacentre photos though. Re the Kell cabinets. We specced one of the 1/2 height ones for a contract gig at a solicitors office. They are awesome (but reassuringly expensive). They're also considerably cheaper than building a "proper" server room from scratch. Regarding airflow, the answer is "it depends". You can run two racks of servers back-to-back into a hot aisle providing you can shift that hot air away at an acceptable rate (you are orders of magnitude more screwed if the aircon goes titsup though). Ask your aircon blokes to calculate it, based on the max heat output of the servers and the rate at which the air-con can shift a given volume of hot air. Edited June 10, 2009 by pete
Duke Posted June 10, 2009 Posted June 10, 2009 I do occasionally look at the Ars forums, but some of those guys are in a whole different league to what we get in education... I'll see if anyone else replies here, if not I might make a new thread with a few other questions as I don't want to hijack this one. Cheers all, Chris
Little-Miss Posted June 10, 2009 Author Posted June 10, 2009 Well if its along the same lines i dont mind you hijaking it, its fizzling out anyway and plus i may learn something too....
BrianG Posted June 10, 2009 Posted June 10, 2009 I look after 6 schools and non of them actually has a server room. The server is normally kept in the ICT suite. HAving said that, at one of my schools the server is laid on it's side ontop of the comms cabinet ( which is about 6ft off the ground, in a classroom !!) and one is in a stationary cupboard. I've only been working these schools for the past 4 weeks, so not my plan to put hte servers where they are, it's definately something i want to look into moving. I can only wish I had a server room
torledo Posted June 10, 2009 Posted June 10, 2009 I'm in the process of doing some server room designs at the moment. I've luckily got a bit of space to play with in the new location but the old location that's going to be used as a disaster recovery site is being cut in size. My question - Does anyone know how much room you should have in front and behind a rack for both maintenance and airflow/cooling? I've looked around and I can't find any definitive figures anywhere besides what server manufacturers recommend for maintenance access. Presumably if I have 1000mm deep racks then I'm going to need 800mm-1000mm plus room for me to stand in front of the rack for maintenance. However, if I have a full 42U rack of server and storage, what's the recommended space around the rack for airflow? We have fairly good aircon, but I'm concerned management will try to cut the room in the DR site and force a rack to end up against a wall. Any thoughts? Cheers, Chris the trouble is, most of the documentation on best practice refers to precision cooling. Most of the time a comfort cooling system is being described which isn't precise at all....for one the air flow is downward rather than being forced up through the floor blowing upward through floor tile grilles. Secondly a lot of data centers have hot and cold aisle containment, they don't want the cold air blowing through servers from the front mixing with hotter exhaust air. CRAC units used in datacentres have a return air capability where they take the hot air in from the top of the crac normally positioned at an end wall in the server room. I suppose you could get some direction with comfort cooling depending on where you put the wall or ceilign mounted unit in relation to the racks but in reality these are designed to cool the room not the equipment directly. What to do with the exhaust air from servers is far more important, would be ideal to be able to remove most of that hot air into the plenum. But how do you do that ? extract fans in the ceiling directly above the rear of the racks ? I think i've got less than 500mm between the rear of the rack and the wall, i have split doors on the rear of the rack to allow for smaller clearance required....best advice would be to have sufficient distance to be able to get round the back and crouch down without distrurbing cabled at the rear of the rack, split doors allow for adequate working room without needing to allocate increased distance to open a full width door fully. As for the height of the ceiling clearance, i don't think a low-ish ceiling prevents a room from being suitable it's how that hot air is contained or removed from the room.
Duke Posted June 10, 2009 Posted June 10, 2009 (edited) Well if its along the same lines i dont mind you hijaking it, its fizzling out anyway and plus i may learn something too.... I figured there might be some common ground in the conversations. I've just done a search on the Ars forums and people seem to be recommending 3ft-4ft in front of the rack and 2ft-3ft behind. With a 1000mm cabinet that means I'm going to need around 3m of space front to back for access and cooling, at least in an ideal world. I think what's being proposed is having the rear of the cabinets fairly close to a wall and aircon mounted directly above them at the top of the same wall. I'm just concerned this will limit airflow to the front of the cabinets and create hot-spots at the rear where the cool air doesn't reach. I'll do a few renders of the new server room and post them up later, might give people some ideas. EDIT: http://www.hardenhuish.wilts.sch.uk/avatar/sr02.jpg http://www.hardenhuish.wilts.sch.uk/avatar/sr03.jpg This is the proposed new room (blue and red areas are hot and cold air). The dimensions of the main area are approximately 3.5m x 3.5m which gives me a bit of room to work with. I'm going to need two 42U racks in there so it's not a huge amount of kit as they won't both be full. The aircon should be a custom design so hopefully we can put it where we want. I'm leaning towards having the racks facing the 'front' wall with the door, they were just rotated that way in the diagram to show someone something. Thanks! Chris Edited June 10, 2009 by Duke
TNE Posted June 10, 2009 Posted June 10, 2009 I figured there might be some common ground in the conversations. I've just done a search on the Ars forums and people seem to be recommending 3ft-4ft in front of the rack and 2ft-3ft behind. With a 1000mm cabinet that means I'm going to need around 3m of space front to back for access and cooling, at least in an ideal world. I think what's being proposed is having the rear of the cabinets fairly close to a wall and aircon mounted directly above them at the top of the same wall. I'm just concerned this will limit airflow to the front of the cabinets and create hot-spots at the rear where the cool air doesn't reach. I'll do a few renders of the new server room and post them up later, might give people some ideas. EDIT: This is the proposed new room (blue and red areas are hot and cold air). The dimensions of the main area are approximately 3.5m x 3.5m which gives me a bit of room to work with. I'm going to need two 42U racks in there so it's not a huge amount of kit as they won't both be full. The aircon should be a custom design so hopefully we can put it where we want. I'm leaning towards having the racks facing the 'front' wall with the door, they were just rotated that way in the diagram to show someone something. Thanks! Chris Hi Chris, Ive recently started sponsoring the forum and we supply racks. I had a chat with the manufacturer regarding your concerns and to see if in fact there are any rules regarding cooling and access. What they say is there are consideration for H&S, Cooling and access to take into account but is difiicult to have hard and fast rules as the design of the room and its own cooling system need to be taken into consideration. They recommend ideally a 1 metre gap on at least three sides, with the cold air channeled to the front of the racks. Also the positioning of the active equipment towards the lower half of the racks if possible. The server cabinets we supply have fully vented doors with the option of wardrobe doors if room is tight. If you require any further information please let me know. When you have all the info required and an idea of the cabinets required I would be happy to provide a quotation including if required the assembly on site including the fitting out with accessories. As an example we are delivering two this weekend and installing them into the server room on the third floor.
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now