Miscellaneous

General data center articles and posts not covered in other categories.

  1. KEN'S KORNER - The Devil's in the Details

    The Devil’s in the Detail The old saying "The Devil's in the Detail" can be related to almost every aspect of data center planning and execution. What detail has been the devil for you? Do you have maintenance outlets in your data center? If not, you should. Maintenance outlets are power receptacles that are NOT fed from the UPS and/or...
  2. KEN'S KORNER - Rules on the Floor

    Rules of the Floor Do you have rules for your critical raised floor? Implementation of this easy project can save time and money by avoiding problems that can occur in your data center. I found that floor rules are easily communicated by posting large signs on all the entrance doors to your critical raised floor, as well as providing small...
  3. KEN'S KORNER - Dangers Lurking Inside Server Cabinets

    Beware the Dangers lurking inside your Server Cabinets! You’re responsible for millions of dollars in equipment and infrastructure investments.  Success is measured in uptime and most people outside of the IT inner circle don’t even know you exist.  Failure is downtime measured in lost revenue, which can run into the millions of dollars per occurrence, and the notoriety that follows...
  4. KEN'S KORNER - 20 Data Center Cleaning Tips

    20 Data Center Cleaning Tips Click here to view, print and share a pdf of this article. Contaminants in a data center can lead to overheating, corrosion damage, electrical and mechanical failure of disk and tape drives, power supplies and circuit boards.  Maintaining a clean data center is critical to its long term success and continued uptime. The sub-floor air...
  5. KEN'S KORNER - Cleaning a Raised Floor

    Cleaning a Data Center Raised Floor Beware Dirty Floors In most cases, a data center’s under floor is also its air plenum.  Not cleaning beneath a raised floor can result in contaminants being drawn into sensitive computer equipment, which can cause overheating and shorten their life. Under floor contaminants will also contribute to dirtier environment throughout the raised floor area...
  6. KEN'S KORNER - Cooling Tower Spring Time Start-Up

    Cooling Tower Spring Time Start-Up Typically in the northern climates cold winters reduce the need for cooling capacity permitting many data centers to take cooling towers off-line.  If you performed an off season lay-up of a cooling tower to help prevent corrosion and bacterial growth, then you are well on your way to a spring start up. Even though you’ve...
  7. KEN'S KORNER - Cooling Tower Off Season Layup

    Cooling Tower Off Season Layup “Chlorine is a deadly poison gas employed on European battlefields in World War I. Sodium is a corrosive metal which burns upon contact with water. Together they make a placid and un-poisonous material, table salt. Why each of these substances has the properties it does is a subject called chemistry.” ---Carl Sagan, Broca's Brain: The...
  8. Occam’s Razor

    Do You Trust Occam's Razor? Occam's (or Ockham's) razor is a scientific principle attributed to the 14th century logician and Franciscan friar William of Ockham. The principle states that "Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily". Occam's razor claims that, "Simpler explanations (solutions) are, other things being equal, generally better than more complex ones". Apply Occam's razor to the problem below...
  9. KEN'S KORNER - UL Listed Power Cables

    Why UL Listed Power Cables By using UL Listed and Hi-pot tested power cable assemblies, data center managers can be certain that the power whip code requirements are met and that there are no weak links in the material used to fabricate the power feeds to the critical servers. If your data center is hosting outside customers; you can feel...
  10. KEN'S KORNER - Load Shedding

    Load Shedding to Reduce Your Electric Utility Bill What happens when you combine regular backup generator preventative maintenance and load testing with load shedding? A significant savings on your electric utility bill!  This was the practice I followed at our data centers.  By participating in load shedding with our local electrical service provider I was able to save over 40...

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