Cost-Effective Server Room Air Conditioning? 414
at0mic26 writes "I am currently tasked with finding a cost effective solution to our 30+ degree Celsius server room. The only air conditioning currently provided is a single duct pipe from one of two air conditioner units. I was thinking of stealing air from the second air conditioning unit with some sheet metal work, but it likely will not be sufficient — and would not have tolerance for both AC units being offline for any amount of time. An ideal supplemental portable AC unit is what I am after, however I'm finding it cost prohibitive, with $600+ humidity controlled AC unit, plus 20 amp socket requirement, plus contract work to make a hole in the wall for outside drainage so that the unit does not flood the place. What sort of successful cheaper air conditioning solutions have you come up with?"
Simply this... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not much you can do (Score:5, Informative)
Dry ice and a fan?
This is not recommended:
Due to the health risks associated with carbon dioxide exposure, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration says that average exposure for healthy adults during an eight-hour work day should not exceed 5,000 ppm (0.5%). The maximum safe level for infants, children, the elderly and individuals with cardio-pulmonary health issues is significantly less. For short-term (under ten minutes) exposure, the U.S. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and American Conference of Government Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) limit is 30,000 ppm (3%). NIOSH also states that carbon dioxide concentrations exceeding 4% are immediately dangerous to life and health.
Holy crap! you're complaining about that cheap? (Score:4, Informative)
You have less than $2500.00 in cost there. Cripes the Libert unit in the server room here cost me $15,000 to have complete. $600 is dirt cheap $2500 is dirt cheap for what you are looking at.
Even if you did the Half-arse way and put 4 window air conditioners in the wall you still need the electrician to run wires.
You'll still come out the same price.
Cost of doing business (Score:5, Informative)
Bite the bullet and get what you need right the first time, because the repair and replace if it isn't done correctly will make $1500 seem like a drop in the bucket...
Re:Not much you can do (Score:3, Informative)
You realize that the GP was being facetious, right?
Can't just add ductwork (Score:4, Informative)
In your posting you talked about adding ducts to steal A/C from a second unit. To work decently you would need to not only add a new output duct 'run', but also a new return 'run' (that is, unless the 2 units share a network of return ducting).
Do it right (Score:3, Informative)
What sort of sucessful cheaper air coniditoning solutions have you come up with?
You've already found the cheap option. Your best bet is to not skimp (unless you like cooking hardware, assuming a reasonable growth rate in computing power under your care) though some of the steps you can take (e.g. hot/cold aisles) are really just rearranging your existing kit and adding some sheet metal work. But that doesn't allow you to skimp on getting adequate cooling. (If you want to know what "adequate cooling" is, ask a real expert; the answer depends on lots of facts you've not revealed.)
Be aware that in large datacenters, the cost of keeping them cool will usually dominate. Really. Be prepared to be your A/C salesman's good customer...
Re:Remove the heat (Score:5, Informative)
Your solution *sounds* nice, but in fact, may drive cooling bills UP.
Where I live, it's routinely over 100 degrees (Yup. Ima 'merkin!) outside, today is expected to hit over 110. In order to provide a net savings, the hot air coming out from your server rack has to be even hotter than that, otherwise you're venting 90 degree air outside, then having to compensate for this by cooling down 110 degree air as it gets sucked into your building.
And this problem is exacerbated if there is relatively high humidity. (EG: Florida) Then, not only are you cooling down the air, you're pumping water out of the air, and since OP mentioned water drains and "not flooding" the place, this may well be him.
Now, if you're in an area where high temps are the exception, this may not be much of an issue. But it sure wouldn't work where I live.
OP: Here's what you do: Go to three reputable contractors. Get three quotes for the job. Get references for each contractor. Present this information to your boss.
If he/she can't handle that, you need to move on anyway.
Here's a tool to help you out (Score:3, Informative)
OK, here's a way to approach the problem.
APC sells racks with integrated cooling. [apc.com] They have an online configurator program. Run the configurator, fill in your info, and you'll get a rack design.
Try changing the "watts per rack" number. Watch what happens as the configurator adds air conditioning units and fans. Note that as the power density goes up, the cost goes way up.
This is where they start to ask questions like "Do we really need a Web 2.0 web site?" Now you're starting to get the picture.
I'm not partticularly recommending APC. They just happen to have a useful online tool, one which can give you something to take to your bosses to give them a sense of the costs as you add more equipment to a rack.
Two good resources on cooling (Score:4, Informative)
The Hot Aisle [thehotaisle.com]: Great blog from Steve O'Donnell with practical ways to implement hot-aisle or cold-aisle containment and economizers.
Data Center Knowledge [datacenterknowledge.com]: Recent articles look at "roll your own" thermal monitoring solutions and using excess heat in swimming pools and greenhouses.
Re:Simply this... (Score:5, Informative)
Sounds like you have more time than money. If you can't afford the cost to beef up the A/C, you can use some of the techniques used in server room design. If you can, take the cold air and put it directly into your hottest (or most expensive to replace maybe) and add partitions to channel the cold air where it will do the most good. Simply mixing a stream of cold air with the warm room air is not efficient. Put the limited cooling where it does the most good, don't let the cold air mix with the hot air, try to channel the hot air away from everything. As an added thought, and exhaust fan somewhere where it is hottest might do considerable good.
Re:insulation (Score:3, Informative)
There's really no reason you need to keep your server room that cold, and you're probably wasting a lot of electricity doing so. You could set that thermostat at least 10 degrees higher and still be fine.
Re:Turn off the servers (Score:5, Informative)
Useful Advice (Score:1, Informative)
Increase the airflow THROUGH the room by using an exhaust fan. Just vent it from near the ceiling to another space.
More airflow = more heat removed
Dial 911 (Score:3, Informative)
.
Two layers of styrofoam on top of the existing sheetrock sounds like a fire waiting to happen.
Foam insulation is relatively hard to ignite but when ignited, it burns readily and emits a dense, black, smoke containing many toxic gases. The combustion characteristics of foam insulation products vary with the combustion temperatures, chemical formulation, and available air. Because of the dangers described above, foams used for construction require a covering as a fire barrier. One half-inch thick (1.27 cm) gypsum wallboard is one of the most common fire barriers. Foam and foam board insulation [nachi.org]
Re:Discussed this with an A/C tech friend. (Score:3, Informative)
That's a good way to go and I'm happy someone had enough sense to actually bring it up.
The first step is to figure out how much cooling you actually need. If you're running commercial grade hardware the BTU/Hr heat output should be listed on the spec sheets. Add it up.
If you're running unrated consumer grade hardware, consider looking for another job. Failing that, though, you can guestimate the heat load by adding up the max output of all the power supplies in the room, multiply by 1.25 (account for PSU efficiency, wiggle room) then convert watts to BTU/Hr by multiplying again by 3.41 (Not Pi - read carefully...)
You'll need an AC unit that meets or exceeds this BTU/Hr rating. I would recommend a split/ductless system for ease of installation: One unit sits outside on a (preferably concrete) pad, the other half hangs on the wall, and you only need a fist-sized hole in the wall to run the pipes and wiring. Such an installation is a pro job, though.
If you insist on going it alone, then portable AC units (as some have mentioned) are your second best bet - just need an exhaust duct, typically 6-8 inch diameter. Most units will evaporate any condensation into the exhaust air.
=Smidge=
Re:this article blows (Score:4, Informative)
True, but condensation can't be an issue anyway. The compressor and condenser must be outside, or you'll just have a fancy heater that blows cold air on one side and drips water on the floor. See the laws of thermodynamics for details.
Re:Not much you can do (Score:2, Informative)
Are these numbers really right for CO2 concentrations? I would think that 4% would occur naturally?
You are only off by two decimal points. The correct figure is 0.038% [wikipedia.org].
Re:Antarctica (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Turn off the servers (Score:3, Informative)
I couldn't have said it better. It's not cheap to run a reliable server room. The hardware that you use to run your systems is rarely the biggest cost. If you need reliability, that means you need:
* easy access to all machines
* utility power
* battery backups
* backup generators
* multiple network entry points
* adequate cooling
* redundant everything
Among other stuff I'm probably forgetting. If you can't afford to build this yourself, it's really best in the long run to host your mission-critical machines in a datacenter that has all of this taken care of for you.
Where I work, we have around 20 great big stonking AC units [liquidweb.com]. These puppies run 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. I can't imagine the fat check our utility company receives each month, but it's clearly worth it since we never have servers die of heat-related problems.
HVAC design for Server rooms (Score:5, Informative)
1. What is your total kW consumed in the room.
2. What is the cooling strategy you want to employ?
Passive cooling - use a fan to dump the heat out of the building.
Active cooling - Install an air conditioner with an external condensing unit to dump the heat outside.
Alternate cooling - Dump the heat into the rest of the building during winter in order to saving on heating costs.
Any of these options have good and bad points: expense, humidity control, thermostat control, expense of use, required backups.
3. How is your server room arranged?
Is everything just thrown in the room?
Are you running a hot isle/cold isle environment?
Do you have a raised server floor so you can pump cold air into the bottom of the racks with a ceiling return?
Do the racks have fans to draw air from front to back?
4. What is your current cooling capacity that is dedicated to that room?
The last server room I designed was 500 square feet and consumed roughly 14 kw (28 watts/sf). That is roughly 4 tons of sensible cooling. To purchase a system capable of 4 tons of sensible cooling you will need to purchase a system capable of 5-6 tons of total cooling (Skipping the lecture on Sensible vs Latent vs Total cooling). So have you have just spent $4,000 in materials. Assume your costs will double for installation. Plus another couple of grand to have an actual engineer come in and design a system that will serve your specific needs.
The question is not one of getting the heat off the chips. The heat is making its way into the air just fine. You need to get the heat out of the air (and the room) and out of the building. If your room is exceeding 30C I would assume your racks are easily running 5-10 degrees hotter. That is getting into the range where your equipment is going to start shutting down.
Now onto your problem: $600 budget. Option: Throw a patch of your choice at it. A roll-a-way unit from Wal-mart or target where you can push a heat rejection duct out of the building, for example. This is a patch, not a solution.
Assume you are going to have to pony up $10,000 (USD) to solve this problem.
Re:Turn off the servers (Score:3, Informative)
Trying to re-educate the boss can easily backfire. [...]
In protest (not wanting to turn my office into a store room), I stacked the stuff in the hallways of our nice new building. I thought this would give ownership the hint.
It sounds like you weren't trying to re-educate the boss. You were clumsily communicating.
Re:this article blows (Score:3, Informative)
The $600 A/C units both I and the poster are talking about sit entirely in the room. Air is drawn from the room, over the condenser and blown out of the room through a duct. For example: http://www.soleusair.com/soleusair/ph1_12r_03_c.html [soleusair.com]
This particular unit also has a "memory" so it starts back up after a power loss. This is particularly critical for a computer room.
Re:insulation (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Turn off the servers (Score:1, Informative)
It had the very big plus side of being obvious to everyone that we had to keep the servers cool, and reminded them every day that the alternative was buying some aircon.
Trying to re-educate the boss can easily backfire. When my company moved to a new building, ownership neglected to account for I.T. storage and workspace needs (workbench, shelving for spare monitors, PC's, cables, software, manuals, etc.) In protest (not wanting to turn my office into a store room), I stacked the stuff in the hallways of our nice new building. I thought this would give ownership the hint. Instead I got the evil eye from the owners and was outsourced shortly thereafter, despite seven years of service with consistently positive annual reviews.
Many owners/bosses got to where they are by persuading others that they know more than they actually do. When you show them up, you become an obstacle to their ambition and ego. To their thinking, you, not the item they were wrong about, is what needs "fixing".
Your boss refusing to pay $600 for A/C to keep thousands of dollars worth of servers running that (probably) contain data worth tens or even hundreds of thousands, is the real problem. But make sure you have calmly and unchallengingly made this clear to him/her. Use phrases like "The plant would be down X days if the servers fail due to heat. How much would that cost?"
As for trying to rig something up yourself, I wouldn't unless you're a certified HVAC technician. Make that clear to the boss too (again as gently as you can). "I'm not trained in this. I don't want to accidentally take A/C away from anyone else--they have work to do to and we can't afford to lower their productivity." Again, make the costs of the lack of $600 apparent if you can.
Good luck!
It had the very big plus side of being obvious to everyone that we had to keep the servers cool, and reminded them every day that the alternative was buying some aircon.
Trying to re-educate the boss can easily backfire. When my company moved to a new building, ownership neglected to account for I.T. storage and workspace needs (workbench, shelving for spare monitors, PC's, cables, software, manuals, etc.) In protest (not wanting to turn my office into a store room), I stacked the stuff in the hallways of our nice new building. I thought this would give ownership the hint. Instead I got the evil eye from the owners and was outsourced shortly thereafter, despite seven years of service with consistently positive annual reviews.
Many owners/bosses got to where they are by persuading others that they know more than they actually do. When you show them up, you become an obstacle to their ambition and ego. To their thinking, you, not the item they were wrong about, is what needs "fixing".
Your boss refusing to pay $600 for A/C to keep thousands of dollars worth of servers running that (probably) contain data worth tens or even hundreds of thousands, is the real problem. But make sure you have calmly and unchallengingly made this clear to him/her. Use phrases like "The plant would be down X days if the servers fail due to heat. How much would that cost?"
As for trying to rig something up yourself, I wouldn't unless you're a certified HVAC technician. Make that clear to the boss too (again as gently as you can). "I'm not trained in this. I don't want to accidentally take A/C away from anyone else--they have work to do to and we can't afford to lower their productivity." Again, make the costs of the lack of $600 apparent if you can.
Good luck!
You were outsourced because you took a pathetic passive aggressive approach and got in everyone's way by putting things in the hall. You should have articulated your needs in English, not passive aggressive actions.
Re:Turn off the servers(outsourced following move) (Score:2, Informative)
Just had to add a comment to this one - which is at a tangent to the general discussion so I apologise.
You weren't outsourced because you annoyed your bosses by stacking boxes in the corridor. The writing was very clearly on the wall from the moment you were moved to a building that had no provision for your service.
Far from neglecting to account for your needs, you were scratched out of the grand plan months before you knew anything about it. It does, after all, take a little while to arrange an outsourcing deal. I should know.
Seen in this light, had you wanted to hold on to some sort of job you were probably best off working twice as hard following the move. Rather than stacking oldware in the hallways.
This sounds very critical of you and I'm sorry, it's not supposed to come over that way. After 7 years it must be very difficult to realise that your employer could literally not care any less about you. But at least you've learned that lesson now so you're ahead.
GP.