What is a data center?
Known as the server farm or the computer room, the data center is where the majority of an enterprise servers and storage are located, operated, maintained and managed. There are four primary components to a data center:
1. White space: This typically refers to the usable raised floor environment measured in square feet (anywhere from a few hundred to a hundred thousand square feet). For data centers that don't use a raised floor environment, the term "white space" may still be used to show usable square footage.
2. Support infrastructure: This refers to the additional space and equipment required to support data center operations — including power transformers, your UPS, generators, computer room air conditioners (CRACs), remote transmission units (RTUs), chillers, air distribution systems, etc. In a high-density, Tier 3 class data center (i.e. a concurrently maintainable facility), this support infrastructure can consume 4-6 times more space than the white space and must be accounted for in data center planning.
3. IT equipment: This includes the racks, cabling, servers, storage, management systems and network gear required to deliver computing services to the organization.
4. Operations: The operations staff assures that the systems (both IT and infrastructure) are properly operated, maintained, upgraded and repaired when necessary. In most companies, there is a division of responsibility between the Technical Operations group in IT and the staff responsible for the facilities support systems.
How are data centers managed?
Operating a data center at peak efficiency and reliability requires the combined efforts of facilities and IT.
IT systems: Servers, storage and network devices must be properly maintained and upgraded. This includes things like operating systems, security patches, applications and system resources (CPU, memory, and storage).
Facilities infrastructure: All the supporting systems in a data center face heavy loads and must be properly maintained to continue operating satisfactorily. These systems include cooling, humidification, air handling, power distribution, backup power generation and much more.
Monitoring: When a device, connection or application fails, it can takedown mission critical operations. Sometimes, one system's failure will lead to applications on other systems that rely on the data or services from the failed unit. A failure in one will compromise all the others. Additionally, modern applications typically have a high degree of device and connection interdependence. Ensuring maximum uptime requires 24/7 monitoring of the applications, systems and key connections involved in all of an enterprises various workflows.
Building Management System: For larger data centers, the building management system (BMS) will allow for constant and centralized monitoring of the facility, including temperature, humidity, power and cooling.
The management of IT and data center facilities are often outsourced to third party companies that specialize in the monitoring, maintenance and remediation of systems and facilities on a shared services basis.
What are some top concerns about data centers?
While the data center must provide the resources necessary for the end users and the enterprise's applications, the provisioning and operation of a data center is divided uncomfortably between IT, facilities and finance, each with its own unique perspective and responsibilities.
IT: It is the responsibility of the business's IT group to make decisions regarding what systems and applications are required to support the business' operations. IT will directly manage those aspects of the data center that relate directly to the IT systems while relying on facilities to provide for the data center's power, cooling, access and physical space.
Facilities: The facilities group is generally responsible for the physical space — for provisioning, operations and maintenance, along with other building assets owned by the company. The facilities group will generally have a good idea of overall data center efficiency and will have an understanding of and access to IT load information and total power consumption.
Finance: The finance group will be responsible for aligning near term vs. long term CAPEX to acquire or upgrade physical assets and OPEX to run them with overall corporate financial operations (balance sheet and cash flow).
Perhaps the biggest challenge confronting these three groups is that by its very nature a data center rarely will be operating at or even close to its optimally defined range. With a typical life cycle of 10 years or might longer, it is essential that the data center's design remains sufficiently flexible to support increasing power densities and various degrees of occupancy over a not insignificant period of time. This in-built flexibility should apply to power, cooling, space and network connectivity. When a facility is approaching its limits of power, cooling and space, the organization will be confronted by the need to optimize its existing facilities, expand them or establish new ones.
What are some data center measurements and benchmarks and where can I find them?
PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness): Created by members of the Green Grid, PUE is a metric used to determine a data center's energy efficiency. A data center's PUE is arrived at by dividing the amount of power entering it by the power used to run the computer infrastructure within it. Expressed as a ratio, with efficiency improving as the ratio approaches 1, data center PUE typically range from about 1.3 (good) to 3.0 (bad), with an average of 2.5 (not so good).
DCiE (Data Center Infrastructure Efficiency): Created by members of the Green Grid, DCiE is another metric used to determine the energy efficiency of a data center, and it is the reciprocal of PUE. It is expressed as a percentage and is calculated by dividing IT equipment power by total facility power. Efficiency improves as the DCiE approaches 100%. A data center's DCiE typically ranges from about 33% (bad) to 77% (good), with an average DCiE of 40% (not so good).
LEED Certified: Developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), LEED is an internationally recognized green building certification system. It provides third-party verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies aimed at improving performance across all the metrics that matter most:- energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emission reduction, the quality of the indoor environment, the stewardship of resources and the sensitivity to their impact on the general environment.
The Green Grid: A not-for-profit global consortium of companies, government agencies and educational institutions dedicated to advancing energy efficiency in data centers and business computing ecosystems. The Green Grid does not endorse vendor-specific products or solutions, and instead seeks to provide industry-wide recommendations on best practices, metrics and technologies that will improve overall data center energy efficiencies.
Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA): TIA is the leading trade association representing the global information and communications technology (ICT) industries. It helps develop standards, gives ICT a voice in government, provides market intelligence, certification and promotes business opportunities and world-wide environmental regulatory compliance. With support from its 600 members, TIA enhances the business environment for companies involved in telecommunications, broadband, mobile wireless, information technology, networks, cable, satellite, unified communications, emergency communications and the greening of technology. TIA is accredited by ANSI.
TIA-942: Published in 2005, the Telecommunications Infrastructure Standards for Data Centers was the first standard to specifically address data center infrastructure and was intended to be used by data center designers early in the building development process. TIA-942 covers:
• Site space and layout
• Cabling infrastructure
• Tiered reliability
• Environmental considerations
Tiered Reliability — The TIA-942 standard for tiered reliability has been adopted by ANSI based on its usefulness in evaluating the general redundancy and availability of a data center design.
Tier 1 Basic — no redundant components (N): 99.671% availability
• Susceptible to disruptions from planned and unplanned activity
• Single path for power and cooling
• Must be shut down completely to perform preventive maintenance
• Annual downtime of 28.8 hours
Tier 2 — Redundant Components (limited N+1): 99.741% availability
• Less susceptible to disruptions from planned and unplanned activity
• Single path for power and cooling includes redundant components (N+1)
• Includes raised floor, UPS and generator
• Annual downtime of 22.0 hours
Tier 3 — Concurrently Maintainable (N+1): 99.982% availability
• Enables planned activity (such as scheduled preventative maintenance) without disrupting computer hardware operation (unplanned events can still cause disruption)
• Multiple power and cooling paths (one active path), redundant components (N+1)
• Annual downtime of 1.6 hours
Tier 4 — Fault Tolerant (2N+1): 99.995% availability
• Planned activity will not disrupt critical operations and can sustain at least one worst-case unplanned event with no critical load impact
• Multiple active power and cooling paths
• Annual downtime of 0.4 hours
Due to the doubling of infrastructure (and space) over Tier 3 facilities, a Tier 4 facility will cost significantly more to build and operate. Consequently, many organizations prefer to operate at the more economical Tier 3 level as it strikes a reasonable balance between CAPEX, OPEX and availability.
Uptime Institute: This is a for profit organization formed to achieve consistency in the data center industry. The Uptime Institute provides education, publications, consulting, research, and stages conferences for the enterprise data center industry. The Uptime Institute is one example of a company that has adopted the TIA-942 tier rating standard as a framework for formal data center certification. However, it is important to remember that a data center does not need to be certified by the Uptime Institute in order to be compliant with TIA-942.
What should I consider when moving my data center?
When a facility can no longer be optimized to provide sufficient power and cooling — or it can't be modified to meet evolving space and reliability requirements — then you're going to have to move. Successful data center relocation requires careful end-to-end planning.
Site selection: A site suitability analysis should be conducted prior to leasing or building a new data center. There are many factors to consider when choosing a site. For example, the data center should be located far from anyplace where a natural disaster — floods, earthquakes and hurricanes — could occur. As part of risk mitigation, locations near major highways and aircraft flight corridors should be avoided. The site should be on high ground, and it should be protected. It should have multiple, fully diverse fiber connections to network service providers. There should be redundant, ample power for long term needs. The list can go on and on.
Moving: Substantial planning is required at both the old and the new facility before the actual data center relocation can begin. Rack planning, application dependency mapping, service provisioning, asset verification, transition plans, test plans and vendor coordination are just some of the factors that go into data center transition planning.
If you are moving several hundred servers, the relocation may be spread over many days. If this is the case, you will need to define logical move bundles so that interdependent applications and services can be moved together so that you will be able to stay in operation up to the day on which the move is completed.
On move day, everything must go like clockwork to avoid down time. Real time visibility into move execution through a war room or a web-based dashboard will allow you to monitor the progress of the move and be alerted to potential delays that require immediate action or remediation.
Known as the server farm or the computer room, the data center is where the majority of an enterprise servers and storage are located, operated, maintained and managed. There are four primary components to a data center:
1. White space: This typically refers to the usable raised floor environment measured in square feet (anywhere from a few hundred to a hundred thousand square feet). For data centers that don't use a raised floor environment, the term "white space" may still be used to show usable square footage.
2. Support infrastructure: This refers to the additional space and equipment required to support data center operations — including power transformers, your UPS, generators, computer room air conditioners (CRACs), remote transmission units (RTUs), chillers, air distribution systems, etc. In a high-density, Tier 3 class data center (i.e. a concurrently maintainable facility), this support infrastructure can consume 4-6 times more space than the white space and must be accounted for in data center planning.
3. IT equipment: This includes the racks, cabling, servers, storage, management systems and network gear required to deliver computing services to the organization.
4. Operations: The operations staff assures that the systems (both IT and infrastructure) are properly operated, maintained, upgraded and repaired when necessary. In most companies, there is a division of responsibility between the Technical Operations group in IT and the staff responsible for the facilities support systems.
How are data centers managed?
Operating a data center at peak efficiency and reliability requires the combined efforts of facilities and IT.
IT systems: Servers, storage and network devices must be properly maintained and upgraded. This includes things like operating systems, security patches, applications and system resources (CPU, memory, and storage).
Facilities infrastructure: All the supporting systems in a data center face heavy loads and must be properly maintained to continue operating satisfactorily. These systems include cooling, humidification, air handling, power distribution, backup power generation and much more.
Monitoring: When a device, connection or application fails, it can takedown mission critical operations. Sometimes, one system's failure will lead to applications on other systems that rely on the data or services from the failed unit. A failure in one will compromise all the others. Additionally, modern applications typically have a high degree of device and connection interdependence. Ensuring maximum uptime requires 24/7 monitoring of the applications, systems and key connections involved in all of an enterprises various workflows.
Building Management System: For larger data centers, the building management system (BMS) will allow for constant and centralized monitoring of the facility, including temperature, humidity, power and cooling.
The management of IT and data center facilities are often outsourced to third party companies that specialize in the monitoring, maintenance and remediation of systems and facilities on a shared services basis.
What are some top concerns about data centers?
While the data center must provide the resources necessary for the end users and the enterprise's applications, the provisioning and operation of a data center is divided uncomfortably between IT, facilities and finance, each with its own unique perspective and responsibilities.
IT: It is the responsibility of the business's IT group to make decisions regarding what systems and applications are required to support the business' operations. IT will directly manage those aspects of the data center that relate directly to the IT systems while relying on facilities to provide for the data center's power, cooling, access and physical space.
Facilities: The facilities group is generally responsible for the physical space — for provisioning, operations and maintenance, along with other building assets owned by the company. The facilities group will generally have a good idea of overall data center efficiency and will have an understanding of and access to IT load information and total power consumption.
Finance: The finance group will be responsible for aligning near term vs. long term CAPEX to acquire or upgrade physical assets and OPEX to run them with overall corporate financial operations (balance sheet and cash flow).
Perhaps the biggest challenge confronting these three groups is that by its very nature a data center rarely will be operating at or even close to its optimally defined range. With a typical life cycle of 10 years or might longer, it is essential that the data center's design remains sufficiently flexible to support increasing power densities and various degrees of occupancy over a not insignificant period of time. This in-built flexibility should apply to power, cooling, space and network connectivity. When a facility is approaching its limits of power, cooling and space, the organization will be confronted by the need to optimize its existing facilities, expand them or establish new ones.
What are some data center measurements and benchmarks and where can I find them?
PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness): Created by members of the Green Grid, PUE is a metric used to determine a data center's energy efficiency. A data center's PUE is arrived at by dividing the amount of power entering it by the power used to run the computer infrastructure within it. Expressed as a ratio, with efficiency improving as the ratio approaches 1, data center PUE typically range from about 1.3 (good) to 3.0 (bad), with an average of 2.5 (not so good).
DCiE (Data Center Infrastructure Efficiency): Created by members of the Green Grid, DCiE is another metric used to determine the energy efficiency of a data center, and it is the reciprocal of PUE. It is expressed as a percentage and is calculated by dividing IT equipment power by total facility power. Efficiency improves as the DCiE approaches 100%. A data center's DCiE typically ranges from about 33% (bad) to 77% (good), with an average DCiE of 40% (not so good).
LEED Certified: Developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), LEED is an internationally recognized green building certification system. It provides third-party verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies aimed at improving performance across all the metrics that matter most:- energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emission reduction, the quality of the indoor environment, the stewardship of resources and the sensitivity to their impact on the general environment.
The Green Grid: A not-for-profit global consortium of companies, government agencies and educational institutions dedicated to advancing energy efficiency in data centers and business computing ecosystems. The Green Grid does not endorse vendor-specific products or solutions, and instead seeks to provide industry-wide recommendations on best practices, metrics and technologies that will improve overall data center energy efficiencies.
Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA): TIA is the leading trade association representing the global information and communications technology (ICT) industries. It helps develop standards, gives ICT a voice in government, provides market intelligence, certification and promotes business opportunities and world-wide environmental regulatory compliance. With support from its 600 members, TIA enhances the business environment for companies involved in telecommunications, broadband, mobile wireless, information technology, networks, cable, satellite, unified communications, emergency communications and the greening of technology. TIA is accredited by ANSI.
TIA-942: Published in 2005, the Telecommunications Infrastructure Standards for Data Centers was the first standard to specifically address data center infrastructure and was intended to be used by data center designers early in the building development process. TIA-942 covers:
• Site space and layout
• Cabling infrastructure
• Tiered reliability
• Environmental considerations
Tiered Reliability — The TIA-942 standard for tiered reliability has been adopted by ANSI based on its usefulness in evaluating the general redundancy and availability of a data center design.
Tier 1 Basic — no redundant components (N): 99.671% availability
• Susceptible to disruptions from planned and unplanned activity
• Single path for power and cooling
• Must be shut down completely to perform preventive maintenance
• Annual downtime of 28.8 hours
Tier 2 — Redundant Components (limited N+1): 99.741% availability
• Less susceptible to disruptions from planned and unplanned activity
• Single path for power and cooling includes redundant components (N+1)
• Includes raised floor, UPS and generator
• Annual downtime of 22.0 hours
Tier 3 — Concurrently Maintainable (N+1): 99.982% availability
• Enables planned activity (such as scheduled preventative maintenance) without disrupting computer hardware operation (unplanned events can still cause disruption)
• Multiple power and cooling paths (one active path), redundant components (N+1)
• Annual downtime of 1.6 hours
Tier 4 — Fault Tolerant (2N+1): 99.995% availability
• Planned activity will not disrupt critical operations and can sustain at least one worst-case unplanned event with no critical load impact
• Multiple active power and cooling paths
• Annual downtime of 0.4 hours
Due to the doubling of infrastructure (and space) over Tier 3 facilities, a Tier 4 facility will cost significantly more to build and operate. Consequently, many organizations prefer to operate at the more economical Tier 3 level as it strikes a reasonable balance between CAPEX, OPEX and availability.
Uptime Institute: This is a for profit organization formed to achieve consistency in the data center industry. The Uptime Institute provides education, publications, consulting, research, and stages conferences for the enterprise data center industry. The Uptime Institute is one example of a company that has adopted the TIA-942 tier rating standard as a framework for formal data center certification. However, it is important to remember that a data center does not need to be certified by the Uptime Institute in order to be compliant with TIA-942.
What should I consider when moving my data center?
When a facility can no longer be optimized to provide sufficient power and cooling — or it can't be modified to meet evolving space and reliability requirements — then you're going to have to move. Successful data center relocation requires careful end-to-end planning.
Site selection: A site suitability analysis should be conducted prior to leasing or building a new data center. There are many factors to consider when choosing a site. For example, the data center should be located far from anyplace where a natural disaster — floods, earthquakes and hurricanes — could occur. As part of risk mitigation, locations near major highways and aircraft flight corridors should be avoided. The site should be on high ground, and it should be protected. It should have multiple, fully diverse fiber connections to network service providers. There should be redundant, ample power for long term needs. The list can go on and on.
Moving: Substantial planning is required at both the old and the new facility before the actual data center relocation can begin. Rack planning, application dependency mapping, service provisioning, asset verification, transition plans, test plans and vendor coordination are just some of the factors that go into data center transition planning.
If you are moving several hundred servers, the relocation may be spread over many days. If this is the case, you will need to define logical move bundles so that interdependent applications and services can be moved together so that you will be able to stay in operation up to the day on which the move is completed.
On move day, everything must go like clockwork to avoid down time. Real time visibility into move execution through a war room or a web-based dashboard will allow you to monitor the progress of the move and be alerted to potential delays that require immediate action or remediation.
