A few weeks
back, we began sharing with you a series of articles chronicling
the ways in which Chatsworth Products, Inc. (CPI) addresses the top
concerns of data center managers today. As documented by the IT
blog Data Center Knowledge in their 2011 Data Center
Market Insight Report, we've so far covered the issues of
running out of space and power, and we now continue our coverage with the
fourth and third-most important data center issues today:
selecting the right technologies and
keeping up with design.
When building a new data center or updating an existing space,
today's data center manager is faced with a multitude of options,
especially when it comes to successfully cooling the data center.
In this area alone, applicable technologies range from
space-hogging CRAC and CRAH units, in-row air conditioners and
highly complex liquid cooling solutions. Though if you're like us,
and immediately start waving the red flag at space-hogging
and highly complex, there's a far simpler, far less costly
and much more effective method of thermal management: passive
cooling.
By isolating
and re-routing the hot exhaust air generated by a data center's
heavy volume of equipment, CPI Passive Cooling® handles small
applications with heat loads of 2kW per cabinet to high density
heat loads pushing 30kW and beyond.
This isolation is so effective in fact that it can be applied at
the cabling level (sealing any and all
cable openings), cabinet level (Vertical Exhaust Ducts to rout
hot air - seen above at right) and the aisle level (both hot and
cold containment in a pod-like environment, also for both access
floor and slab floor environments). Refer to our brand new Data Center Solutions
brochure for complete details on each.
In response to keeping up with data center design, it's
important to note that not all data centers are created equal.
While large-scale enterprises can afford to roll the dice on
non-traditional design schemes (Yahoo's "chicken coop" comes to mind), there
are just as many of you out there (okay, more!) who are simply
looking to keep up with the Joneses (or in this case, the
Facebook's and Google's of the world) on a much smaller, more
traditional scale.
To ensure the most up-to-date and necessary design schemes are
being used to maximize efficiency, CPI offers dedicated
consultation (including preliminary site visits), state-of-the-art
computational
fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis to simulate cooling trends, and a
wide variety of free, online Design Tools and
Downloads, including CAD
Blocks, Visio Shapes and 3D BIM
Drawings to make your design selection
process as informed as possible.
Ultimately, selecting the right technology is in itself an
effective method for keeping up with design in the data center. And
while newer doesn't always mean better, you can rest assured that
CPI's constantly monitoring new trends and techniques to best serve
your data center needs. Jeff Cihocki,
eContent Specialist