Server Room Air Conditioner Reviews: Hot and Cold Aisle Temperature Control in Colocation Centres

There are a number of factors that colocation companies need to take into account when planning and running their data centre. They will need to think about how to best follow security and maintenance practices, how much to charge, what levels of support to offer and how to achieve the highest rates of uptime. These are all important considerations, but colocation providers will also need to think about how best to control the temperature inside the data centre. For those who are new to the concept of colocated hosting, this may seem like an odd priority to have, however, temperature and environment control is hugely important in data centres and can greatly impact the efficiency and availability of the servers and hardware.

Why is temperature so important? Servers need to be kept at very precise temperatures in order to function at their optimum capability. If the equipment overheats then sever performance can be negatively affected, in some cases the equipment can even be damaged by too high a temperature. If the air in the centre is too cool, moisture can form that can cause salt deposits to grow on the conductive filaments. The recommended temperature is usually between 20 and 25 degrees Celsius, although the majority of recommendations offered by various commentators will fall somewhere between 15 and 32 degrees Celsius. Humidity control is also important as too much humidity can cause moisture to form in the hardware while too little will cause static electricity discharge problems.

Server Room Air Conditioner

In order to maintain an optimum temperature, most colocation centres will adopt some form of cooling method. One of the most popular cooling systems is what is known as a Hot or Cold Aisle Cooling System. This system involves positioning the servers in a particular way so that the hot exhaust air that they give out is either contained or directed away from the intake side of the servers. Using hot and cold aisles is a useful was of conserving energy and reducing cooling costs which can be crucial to colocation centres. The servers will be arranged so that all the rack fronts are facing the same way forming what is known as a 'cold aisle' that will face the air conditioners' output ducts. The backs of the servers, which typically are where the exhaust hot air is given out, will form a 'hot aisle'. The air flow is then managed so that the cold air given out by the computer room air conditioners is directed towards the cold aisle, while the hot air given out by the servers is directed towards the air conditioners' intake area.

Hot and Cold Aisle Temperature Control in Colocation Centres

This hot aisle/cold aisle system can be very useful for managing air flow but many colocation centres will take this system one step further to make it more efficient by introducing either a hot air containment system or a cold air containment system. A containment system will reduce the mixing of cold and hot air and will isolate them from each other - thereby making the system more efficient. Initially many of the containment 'systems' introduced by colocation centres were almost home-made - for example the use of plastic curtains was popular at one time and can still be found in many data centres. Today, however, many data centres will install special doors and ceiling panels that will help to enclose the different types of air.

In a cold air containment system, the cold air is contained and directed down the cold aisle. This transforms the rest of the data centre into a hot air return space. Containment systems will often make use of a plenum which is a separate space for the air to travel through. A plenum may be under a raised floor where the cold air can be released through perforated floor tiles in front of the servers. Equally a plenum can be in the space between the building's ceiling and a drop down ceiling. A hot air containment system will be essentially the reverse of a cold air containment system. The hot aisle will be enclosed and the hot air is collected and channelled directly into the cooling systems.

Spacing in colocation centres needs to be very precise as the wrong spacing can completely change the efficiency of the hardware. Hot air containment systems are considered by some to be the more effective approach than a cold air containment system. This is because the hot aisle will not affect the rest of the data centre and the hot air that is produced can be quickly directed into the cooling system. Hot aisle/cold aisle is a practice that is used by many colocation centres. It was thought up by Robert Sullivan of the Uptime Institute and has since become considered the best practice for data centre layouts.

Hot and Cold Aisle Temperature Control in Colocation Centres

Server Room Air Conditioner Reviews

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Hot and Cold Aisle Temperature Control in Colocation Centres

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