Legacy Data Centres can be more efficient and deliver better practicing PUE ...... No hidden secret its only Air flow and thermal management

The below is based on study and observation of more than 500 Data Centres, Telecom MSCs, Switch rooms and critical facility built with raised floor (Access Floor). The major challenge is thermal management due to air flow issues, the same phenomena observed across major telecom players across the world

The Challenges leading to poor PUE

Choked with cables, wires, Patch cards below Raised (Access) Floor

Mix of high density and low density racks next to each other

Rack and its devices orientation challenges hot air blow to other rack's cold air suction point

Mix of Devices orientation within rack, Open vents of patch card terminals

Stacking of multiple servers in rack, leading the servers in lower portion of rack receive cold and higher quantity of air, while servers in higher portion lack air flow, Air starvation and warm temperature

Open racks, Racks without fans on the top for hot air displacement

Uneven sizes of racks

Lack of cold and hot aisle portions

Air leakage through tile openings, joints and Cut tile openings, below the rack opening for rack cable entry

Inadequate space between racks

Lack of blanking panels in the racks in non equipment etc and some more

all of the above lead to inefficient thermal management and poor PUE

Addressing Choked floor

The Raised (Access) Floor are used as plenum for perimeter based air-conditioning system to transport cold air to required area, through perforated tiles. The area below raised floor space has positive cold air and need to free from obstacle for free air flow, but the status is different and in reality the area is blocked by higher, excess quantity patch cards, power cable for servers, switches and routers. Most of the Telecom MSC, switch centres and Data Centres with raised floor has chronic issue of choked understructure below the raised (access) floor, with extra length patch cards, Power cables, Optical fiber cables and its protection ducts, to over come the air flow issues Active tiles are used for forced air circulation in desired , choked area.

Active tIle

Active tile is a perforated tile fixed with fan below surface. The fan switches on, modulate its speed for higher , lower air circulation based on temperature sensor fixed in near by rack or in the tile. The active tile is placed after removing the non perforated/perforated tile in the raised (Access) floor. The active tile also helps air circulation during utility to DG change over visa versa, if connected to uninterrupted source of power. Normally during change over, the Air condition system do not work , while the servers and switches work through batteries connected through UPS or rectifiers.

Challenges in present active tiles

Single Fan (EC or non EC fan) - Single point of failure

Single Power supply - Single point of failure

400 mm minimum depth required - Not possible to install, where cable choking is more

AC power operated - Only UPS operated

Higher Noise level

Full Tile perforation - allows dust to fall inside and walking on top of it

Low holding strength , less than 200 Kg point load on surface, avoid walking over it

The new Design

?Active tile deployment recommended , necessary to meet higher cold air requirement high power density racks.

The air balancing becomes challenging? under following situations

1.High power density? ?racks deployed along with different density racks since different density racks need different CFM to operate

2.Mixing of different air flow racks and devices , as the need is different suction points and direction

3. High power density racks installed with same server type from bottom to top of the racks , while the lowest server has higher proximity air from perforated access floor tile/grill.

Considering above its recommended to use different CFM based Active tiles based on server needs, there are Active tiles available with temperature based CFM changed but not based on rack cfm need for better air balance. The different CFM based models still need to have variable Speed fans to ensure temperature based ??CFM increase and decrease

The new active tile design

World thin tile? 1/6 of active tiles available in the Market 70 mm Vs 400mm?

Thin matters a lot when access floor is choked with cables , the traditional tiles need clear space below , while the new tiles do not require any space, the fans pulls air through cables also

Easy to Install, just remove existing tile and replace

Can be installed? choked cable area also, while general stuff available in market cant be because it needs minimum 450mm space Floor? and extra brackets required to hold tile

Fiber reinforced vs metal based enables light weight

The fibre reinforced makes light weight yet strong , corrosion free and electrical insulated and Anti-static vs the traditional metal based tile, which are heavy, conductive with static influence

Multiple fans?

4 or 8 Fan system vs traditional single fan system, The new tile works even fan? failure stage with alarm, these fans are easily available and onsite replaceable by anyone, the space fans small in size 100mm*100mm*20mm as compared tradition and EC fans which are 580mm*580mm*450mm

Dual Power supply for tiles

The active is connected with dual power source to ensure redundancy.??????????? …..????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Alternate fans has source 1 and Source 2 power feed, while traditional tile has single fan and single supply , The fans low noise , brushless, low vibration DC fans 48dBA vs traditional EC fans which are higher than 72dBA

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Power Supply ?for tile

The input power UPS (230VAC) or SMPS (48VDC) Power, design available or single tile with AC and DC

Foot step Area?????

The tile has foot step area to avoid dust to go through perforated area? as compared to traditional active tile ????????????????????????????????????????

??????????????????????????????? Light weight modular composite

?????????????????????????????? The new Tile is 40% lighter than the traditional tile , economic to transport

?????????????????????????????? Economy

?????????????????????????????? 50% the cost the EC fan based active tile

?????????????????????????????? 60% Less weight and 1/10 of thickness makes economic transport cost

?????????????????????????????? 50% Lower energy consumption

????????????????????????????? Like to Like of traditional tile designs

????????????????????????????? Temperature based fan speed for air delivery

????????????????????????????? Temperature display

Appreciate your views and feed back??

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