You have your servers set up at a colocation data center, or your own. You’re running into performance issues, hardware failures and spontaneous rebooting. Everything else seems to check out, so it’s time to look into cooling issues your data center location may be facing. Keeping the data center cool is an essential part of server performance. Here are a few data center cooling methods to implement to keep your servers running strong.
1. Hot-aisle/cool-aisle data center cooling techniques. This cooling technique coordinates the cool air intakes and hot air exhausts so they’re facing specific directions. In many data centers, this technique is accomplished by facing cold air intakes near the air conditioning units. The hot air exhaust is arranged so they go into an isolated hot-aisle. This controlled air flow method gets the cool air where it needs to go and keeps the hot air away from critical components.
2. Reducing floor space. If you reduce the amount of space you have to cool overall, it’s easier to set up more efficient cooling solutions. Look into your infrastructure needs to determine if you need as many servers as you have running. It’s possible switching to a different type of server with more capacity may reduce the volume of your server needs. A hybrid server solution utilizing some cloud components also removes some burden from your data center.
3. Improve airflow. One of the biggest culprits for insufficient cooling in a data center is the air flow. Either the ventilation isn’t powerful enough, filters are clogged, or the server room isn’t laid out in a fashion that allows proper air flow. Use blanking curtains to separate your servers, identify high heat areas of the server room and introduce spot cooling methods, and employ cable management techniques to keep sufficient airflow.
4.Upgrading server cooling. Sometimes the problem isn’t with the server room’s cooling system, but the servers themselves. Make sure the fans on each server are functioning correctly, switch particularly high heat output servers to more efficient and powerful cooling options, and consider liquid cooling for your most egregious offenders. Research the options available to you before making costly purchases that won’t be beneficial to your cooling needs.
5. Audit equipment. Do you really need all those servers sitting in your data center? Are you holding onto legacy equipment “just in case?” Create a complete inventory of the server equipment you have on hand, what each server is used for, and whether server functions can be consolidated with other equipment you have on hand. If you reduce the amount of equipment in your data center, or upgrade with more energy efficient servers, you adjust your cooling needs.
Don’t let high heat bring your servers to their knees. Take a strong stance on fixing heating issues before you end up dealing with massive problems resulting from insufficient cooling. Once you have a new cooling system in place, focus on preventative maintenance techniques to identify any impending heat issues to head them off at the pass.
In fact, the CLI only runs a command line, which reduces the amount of system resources it needs, making it not only easier to locate files and use system features, but it also speeds up the entire process as more system resources can go into the search speed.
+Katrina is a product specialist, solving issues for your computer server and power needs at Racksolutions.com
