Air flow management is crucial to protecting your servers and rack systems. Sometimes, however, your current data center design may not be providing to the most effective air flow possible. You should consider that your servers could benefit from a new data center layout due to current inefficient air flow. A new design implementation could foster better flow of air within hot and cold aisle containment models and produce steady cooling results, all while improving energy and providing cost saving efficiencies. Learn more about how a new data center design could keep your system running smoothly well into the future.

Improved Air Flow

Data centers are constantly working to process information, and with this work comes an output of constant heat. If data centers become overheated, they can malfunction and harm your server units.

Many companies may think their current data center designs are the most efficient in air flow and heat management; however, a new layout could yield improved air flow and reduce the likelihood of problems with your server aisle temperatures. To keep your data centers running smoothly and without cooling issues, you will want to have an air flow management plan in place—which involves hot or cold aisle containment. By consulting with a data center specialist to plan a renovation of your current design, you can develop a more efficient layout that works to keep your servers and server aisles at an ideal temperature.

Create Consistency in Temperatures

While your current air flow management plan for your data center may be effective, it could still be producing inconsistent or ineffective cooling to your system. A new data center design could produce steadier temperatures for your system, ultimately bolstering the performance of your hot and cold aisle containment models. By persistently keeping the temperatures in your containment consistent, you can ultimately produce better cooling results.

Checking for hot spots and overly cooled areas in the cold aisles can be done inexpensively with several thermometers. Hot or overly cooled spots are usually the result of incorrect placement of cold air distribution outlets and/or a lack of CFM/air movement coming into the aisle. If you have floor mounted cold air inputs, make certain that you place some of the test thermometers at the top of the rack and at the furthest point from the cold air input. Also, make certain that you are not overcooling your cold air. Use multiple small thermometers placed at no less than four locations in the aisle(s).

Reduce Energy Costs

Data centers inevitably use a large amount of energy, especially as you utilize more server racks. An optimized data center design can create more energy efficiency. As you create your new data center design for less energy usage, you can implement various techniques. First, you can seal the area to control the humidity levels and make sure your hot or cold aisle containment models are only using the energy needed, which will reduce your energy usage. During your data center redesign, you will also need to audit your space to take note of current rack and cable placement. Your data center specialist can determine that a different layout would promote better cooling while also being more energy efficient.

Creating Room for Expansion

Over time, your data center needs may change. Your company may have a need to increase the quantity of servers, racks and aisles for expansion and you will need to control these new cooling patterns. For growth situations such as these, you’ll need to create more room. Your current data center layout may not be the most effective use of space—and a new layout plan could remedy this. After consulting with your data center experts, you may realize you can create an improved layout with hot or cold aisle containment models that not only allows for more server racks, but will also help you better manage air flow and temperature controls in the new space.

If you are considering future expansion of your data center, you may want to maximize all of the prospective space or clearance that is available for extending your cold air supply and warm air return ducts. As you begin to consider the options for improving the air flow patterns within the data center please note: the cooled air input and warm air return locations are the most important elements to ‘arrange’. You may also want to make the jump to a higher capacity CRAC unit if your position is borderline or if you are allocating space for additional CRAC/ duct work. Cable access into the data center is not as critical as is air movement, but can sometimes cause complications if not planned out ahead of time.

One of the first steps should be to quantify the new total or estimated amount of servers and/or racks. Next, map out and combine the “new” total square / cubic foot quantity with the new total server and rack quantity. You should have a qualified HVAC technician who is familiar with data center cooling access your cooling capacity relative to the new server heat load and total space.