Cool!

Some years ago, we undertook a small experiment with our server room. We had heard that other people were reducing the amount of A/C cooling they used and we wanted to see if it was appropriate for us.

Like a lot of other places, our small server room was kept cool to keep the servers cool; if we were to spend any length of time in there, we would need to put on a jumper or even a fleece to stay warm, as the room was around 10 degrees centigrade. The A/C units were running non stop, and we wanted to see if we could reduce the electric we used.

Essentially, we made a load of measurements to get a base line. These included the core temperature of the UPS, some measurements of the servers and various places within the server room. We were fortunate that our engineering manager had a device that we could borrow for this as he was conducting a number of tests to help the company work towards ISO14001.

He also had a device that allowed us to measure the amount of power drawn by various devices – we seemed to get a couple of slightly odd readings, but when we discounted those, the average values appeared to match what would be expected. We therefore assumed that the errors we had were down to incorrect use.

Having got our base line values, we then started to increase the ambient temperature of the room, and examine what affect this had. Each time, we would leave the changed settings for a couple of weeks to see what would happen; in each case, there was no sign of distress on the servers, so we were able to increase the temperature again.

After some time, we found that the “sweet spot” was between 20 and 24 degrees centigrade. Above 24 degrees, we would see the fans in the servers starting to work much harder and draw more power. Below 20 degrees, the A/C was still running almost all the time. However, in that range, we found that we had the A/C unit running at its least power draw whilst the servers ran at a comfortable level.

We found that in the racks, we had a few “hot spots”; places where the temperature was quite a bit higher than the ambient temperature of the room. We were told that this is normal and generally considered a good thing; these create a thermal current that allows the cooling to happen naturally. The interesting thing was that although the ambient temperature increased by 12 degrees, the hot spots only increased by 3-4 degrees.

Part of the work meant that we had to make sure that the racks were properly positioned in the room to allow for adequate air flow, and the direction of air from the A/C also had to be optimised to prevent “air curtains” forming at various places. We also had to make sure that things such as blanking plates were used to ensure a properly controlled air current within the racks.

Although this all sounds very grand, the room is quite small and most of the work was done in between our normal activities. We were able to make use of some additional advice from the A/C supplier, but that was relatively minor. The total amount of work required was actually quite small, but the results have been very good. We have seen a reduction in power consumption of just under 50% for the server room as a whole – which translates into significant cost savings.

I’ve added a link to a resource that I would recommend to anyone wanting to do work on their server room facilities. It is primarily aimed at North America, but there are some bits that are specifically for the European market. It will take some time to go through all of it, but I consider that it would be time well spent.

http://www.schneider-electric.com/sites/corporate/en/products-services/training/energy-university/energy-university.page?tsk=77518T&pc=26947T&keycode=77518T&promocode=26947T&promo_key=26947T

The really good thing - we now have a server room that we can work in, in reasonable comfort all the time!

I'm back!

It's been a while since I posted anything; 6 months in fact. It's not a case of having nothing to write about, far from it. I've just been very busy, plus I've been a bit more active in other areas.

One thing that I thought would be appropriate to point out is a Microsoft resource at: http://www.microsoft.com/uk/business/peopleready/technology/ioassessment/osyci/survey.mspx
This allows you to take a "survey" that can give you an indication of the status of your IT provision. I first came across this a while back and I found it very useful as part of the planning process. In order for you to reach a particular destination, it helps to know where you are starting from, so you can use the right directions.

Essentially, Microsoft suggest that IT departments can be classified into one of 4 levels based upon standard practice. Five years ago, we would have definitely been classed as being at the lowest level, "reactive". The IT provision was based around fixing problems after they occurred and very little thought went into planning or preparation.

We've slowly moved through the various stages, going from "standardised" to "rationalised", and are now pretty much at the top level, "strategic". There are still a few areas that we could improve upon, but that will always be the case. However, the IT is now a solid platform that people can use. We don't get the network failures, system crashes, or data losses that used to occur. Resources are there and available 24 x 365 for people to use, and generally they can access them using whatever device is appropriate.

Now although this all sounds great, there is unfortunately a fly in the ointment. The biggest problem is still the unit that is positioned between the chair and keyboard! It has been identified that we need to get people better trained, but somehow that never seems to get translated into action. Once of the worst instances was of a person that had been with the company for some 8 years. Unable to logon, the person phoned the helpdesk to ask what her user name was! (She normally didn't have to type that in, as it just appeared in the login box.)

I would encourage everyone to take a look at the Microsoft Core Infrastructure Optimisation resource. I think that you'll find it of significant value and help.