Bloody heat ?

Nutcracker,
You are the expert, just how hot can the ambient temperature be with theses
servers and raid enclosures be before something starts crapping out?

We lost the HVAC to the server room, we have doors open (NO windows in room)
multiple fans going and it's still hot as hell.

Hopefully tomorrow will have it fixed, but this heat concerns me. I had
backups to what I thought was everything BUT the cooling. For some reason I
did not take that failure into consideration.

Thanks,
Phil

Hello Phil,

To an extent, it depends on the models of the servers. I have never had a
problem with storage shutting down, and I have had that stuff running in
some very HOT environments.

There are parts to my answer.

First, most of the systems will go into Thermal Shutdown around 105 degree's
F (internal temp). They will shut down (gracefully) until they cool off. At
5 minute intervals, the servers power back on to see if they have cooled
down enough to power up and start running again.

As long as you have *some* airflow going into the front of those machines,
and there is ample airflow to exhaust the heat that comes out of the backs,
you should be OK until you get the HVAC system repaired.

Second, setting up the servers for a Thermal ASR (automatic server reset) is
an OPTION. It doesnt have to be enabled for the servers to operate. Of
course, you do so at your own risk.

If you have the system management hompage installed on your amchines, then
you should be able go into it and tell the server whether or not you want
Thermal Reset (or something like that) enabled.

If you have any other quetsions, I will be happy to answer them for you.

- LC

"Phil" wrote in message
...
Nutcracker,
You are the expert, just how hot can the ambient temperature be with
theses
servers and raid enclosures be before something starts crapping out?

We lost the HVAC to the server room, we have doors open (NO windows in
room)
multiple fans going and it's still hot as hell.

Hopefully tomorrow will have it fixed, but this heat concerns me. I had
backups to what I thought was everything BUT the cooling. For some reason
I
did not take that failure into consideration.

Thanks,
Phil

LC,
That 105 may be the magic number, but that room was allot hotter than that.

I'm using about 25 servers, 1850R's and dl380's with a few more odd balls.
10 of the EU's 12 drives ea and 4 newer arrays 14 dives ea. Add the
switches, kvm, kvm extenders, ip control, multiple 3, and 6, KVA UPS's,
satellite equipment, routers, phone equipment, alarm equipment, CCTV
equipment, monitors and lighting and that's allot of heat. There is also a
bank of transformers in a big steel cabinet that generate heat too, can
hardly touch them, they tie into the panels and backup generators.

I didn't realize it until I started counting, but over 200 scsi drives in
that mess. Nowhere else do I have a concentration of over about 5 computers.
Already switched all my monitors out to flat screens which saved a few bucks
on power and heat.

We cut a 5-foot hole in the roof of that small building, pulled the drop
ceiling tiles out above the racks and temporarily set a 5-foot ceiling fan
over the cutout in the roof. That has dropped the temp considerably, and is
moving a hurricane like flow of air through now.

So far nothing has shut down from heat (that I know of), but this morning I
had 6 bix box fans blowing directly on the racks. I had already shut some
stuff down, but some stuff has to operate regardless.

Heat, and power is one reason I was thinking about upgrading to more modern
servers, but I question what dependability I would gain with the new cheaper
built equipment. This stuff has worked trouble free, and does everything I
need, just not cheap to operate and probably more dependable than new
equipment. I thought I had it set up so that any given failure would not
stop any process but 95 degrees outside is not helping. Damn, it's been hot.

Time to redesign my layout after this. I've learned allot about server
operation, but it has been a slow evolution and a continuous learning
experience, most the hard way. We never planed to have that much "stuff" in
there, it's been a slow process of adding equipment, so it simply wasn't
designed for.

Thanks again, for the time,
Phil

"Nut Cracker" wrote in message
...
Hello Phil,

To an extent, it depends on the models of the servers. I have never had a
problem with storage shutting down, and I have had that stuff running in
some very HOT environments.

There are parts to my answer.

First, most of the systems will go into Thermal Shutdown around 105
degree's
F (internal temp). They will shut down (gracefully) until they cool off.
At
5 minute intervals, the servers power back on to see if they have cooled
down enough to power up and start running again.

As long as you have *some* airflow going into the front of those machines,
and there is ample airflow to exhaust the heat that comes out of the
backs,
you should be OK until you get the HVAC system repaired.

Second, setting up the servers for a Thermal ASR (automatic server reset)
is
an OPTION. It doesnt have to be enabled for the servers to operate. Of
course, you do so at your own risk.

If you have the system management hompage installed on your amchines, then
you should be able go into it and tell the server whether or not you want
Thermal Reset (or something like that) enabled.

If you have any other quetsions, I will be happy to answer them for you.

- LC

"Phil" wrote in message
...
Nutcracker,
You are the expert, just how hot can the ambient temperature be with
theses
servers and raid enclosures be before something starts crapping out?

We lost the HVAC to the server room, we have doors open (NO windows in
room)
multiple fans going and it's still hot as hell.

Hopefully tomorrow will have it fixed, but this heat concerns me. I had
backups to what I thought was everything BUT the cooling. For some
reason
I
did not take that failure into consideration.

Thanks,
Phil

LS, yes I know what I have, UE, arrays !, my daughter is in Europe and
guess that was somewhat on my mind ( EU)
Long hot aggravating day. A total loss of time.
Phil

hehe ... nice.

"Phil" wrote in message
...
LS, yes I know what I have, UE, arrays !, my daughter is in Europe and
guess that was somewhat on my mind ( EU)
Long hot aggravating day. A total loss of time.
Phil

Interesting you should bring this up, I am currently working for a
company that is suffering through to an A/C failure for the entire building
that has the server room shut down. Some joker brought in an old gas
station thermometer that was scaled to 135(F) degrees. It topped out in
under 15 minutes. As a temp solution we have moved the servers out and
distributed them around the network in what has to be one of the most
physically unsecured environments possible.

Two other sites I've worked at have had heat issues and in both cases
the key was air flow just as you have found out. In both instances heat was
not considered during the initial establishment of the server room. Here
are the two long term solutions they came up with and the solution I have
put forward for my current position.

1. Location, one story office complex with server room in a windowless
former storage room. Just like you we cut a large hole out, but in the back
wall. We then had installed an independent A/C unit (the same as some cheap
motels use) with a thermal switch set at 80 degrees. Setting was found
through trial and error as we noted the A/C unit needed a bit of a head
start to keep the server room temperature below 90 degrees. Realizing that
the ambient air temperature needed to be cooler than the max operating
temperature of the servers to provide the necessary heat transfer as it was
pulled through the cases.

2. Location, at the top of a stair well in a split level building. Server
room has it's own HVAC unit, but no back up. The HVAC was running 24/7/365
and the room temperature averaged around 80 degrees regardless of the season
or the thermostats settings. Due to power availability and structural
issues, we cut a hole in the ceiling and installed a large drum fan with
ducting to carry the hot air out of the building and provide a weather proof
system. Site is in a hurricane prone area and to date the ducting has kept
the rain out. The only draw back is that the fan is very noisy, but then it
is an emergency fall back system so it is not on that often. Later we
redirected an HVAC vent from a storage closet on the first floor into the
server room as a back up. The fan kept the temperature within the
operational range, but the front office didn't like the techs working in
shorts and t-shirts.

3. Location, former common/meeting room in the center (20 feet from nearest
accessible outside wall) of a multi-story office building. They now have
some high efficiency A/C unit for home/office room additions that only
require a 3 inch opening to connect the inside and outside units. Am
proposing we install same. Local climate control folks say that the piping
can be run with a bit of custom work on their part. With proper insulation
there should be no problem with condensation and the unit can support the
expected heat load. This will make the server room independent of the
buildings HVAC should it fail in the future. One advantage the climate
control folks mentioned is that the replacement unit for the HVAC unit would
need to be scaled up as the original unit was never intended to support the
sort of heat load that the server room adds to the building. Cost wise it
comes out about even and should the server room system fail in the future we
have the option to open up both ends of the server room and sponge off the
buildings ambient air until it can be fixed.

As a point of minor interest, the local community college uses it's
former mainframe server room as a mortuary. They long ago built a
"Technology Center" to hold their server rooms and computer labs. Until
they began teaching "Mortuary Science" the room was of little use due to the
custom HVAC system being to cold for classrooms or offices and the being no
heating system, the heat from the servers was ample enough.

KC


"Phil" wrote in message
...
LC,
That 105 may be the magic number, but that room was allot hotter than
that.

I'm using about 25 servers, 1850R's and dl380's with a few more odd balls.
10 of the EU's 12 drives ea and 4 newer arrays 14 dives ea. Add the
switches, kvm, kvm extenders, ip control, multiple 3, and 6, KVA UPS's,
satellite equipment, routers, phone equipment, alarm equipment, CCTV
equipment, monitors and lighting and that's allot of heat. There is also a
bank of transformers in a big steel cabinet that generate heat too, can
hardly touch them, they tie into the panels and backup generators.

I didn't realize it until I started counting, but over 200 scsi drives in
that mess. Nowhere else do I have a concentration of over about 5
computers.
Already switched all my monitors out to flat screens which saved a few
bucks
on power and heat.

We cut a 5-foot hole in the roof of that small building, pulled the drop
ceiling tiles out above the racks and temporarily set a 5-foot ceiling fan
over the cutout in the roof. That has dropped the temp considerably, and
is
moving a hurricane like flow of air through now.

So far nothing has shut down from heat (that I know of), but this morning
I
had 6 bix box fans blowing directly on the racks. I had already shut some
stuff down, but some stuff has to operate regardless.

Heat, and power is one reason I was thinking about upgrading to more
modern
servers, but I question what dependability I would gain with the new
cheaper
built equipment. This stuff has worked trouble free, and does everything I
need, just not cheap to operate and probably more dependable than new
equipment. I thought I had it set up so that any given failure would not
stop any process but 95 degrees outside is not helping. Damn, it's been
hot.

Time to redesign my layout after this. I've learned allot about server
operation, but it has been a slow evolution and a continuous learning
experience, most the hard way. We never planed to have that much "stuff"
in
there, it's been a slow process of adding equipment, so it simply wasn't
designed for.

Thanks again, for the time,
Phil

"Nut Cracker" wrote in message
...
Hello Phil,

To an extent, it depends on the models of the servers. I have never had
a
problem with storage shutting down, and I have had that stuff running in
some very HOT environments.

There are parts to my answer.

First, most of the systems will go into Thermal Shutdown around 105
degree's
F (internal temp). They will shut down (gracefully) until they cool off.
At
5 minute intervals, the servers power back on to see if they have cooled
down enough to power up and start running again.

As long as you have *some* airflow going into the front of those
machines,
and there is ample airflow to exhaust the heat that comes out of the
backs,
you should be OK until you get the HVAC system repaired.

Second, setting up the servers for a Thermal ASR (automatic server
reset)
is
an OPTION. It doesnt have to be enabled for the servers to operate. Of
course, you do so at your own risk.

If you have the system management hompage installed on your amchines,
then
you should be able go into it and tell the server whether or not you
want
Thermal Reset (or something like that) enabled.

If you have any other quetsions, I will be happy to answer them for you.

- LC

"Phil" wrote in message
...
Nutcracker,
You are the expert, just how hot can the ambient temperature be with
theses
servers and raid enclosures be before something starts crapping out?

We lost the HVAC to the server room, we have doors open (NO windows in
room)
multiple fans going and it's still hot as hell.

Hopefully tomorrow will have it fixed, but this heat concerns me. I
had
backups to what I thought was everything BUT the cooling. For some
reason
I
did not take that failure into consideration.

Thanks,
Phil

LC, Kevin,
In my case equipment is in a small (1500sf) separate concrete block building
with foam insulated, and sheet rocked walls and no windows. We have a 4-foot
space between the drop ceiling and the roof. Roof is flat so I thought
cutting rafters would be easier, cheaper, and quicker than walls. I'm going
to leave that fan on the roof, have a weatherproof enclosure built over the
fan with louvers and install steel bars for security. It's a temporary
solution, but in light of a total loss of operation, it is working.

I'm up in the mountains of North Carolina and we rarely see these high
outside temperatures and can hardly justify installing two HVAC systems.
(perhaps I need to reevaluate that too) Our compressor took a nosedive and
it wasn't a simple quick fix. I've found for the most part, build a backup
to the primary "whatever" and the primary won't fail or don't prepare and
look out. I'll leave that fan on the roof, just in case, but it is working
(cross fingers) and nothing is shutting down now, although still too warm to
comfortably work in there with clothes on!

Yesterday, prior to the hole/fan we did start having failures in some
servers. Luckily it was not all servers and the amazing thing was the their
respective backups kept going so I didn't loose one file.

I have too much equipment to temporarily relocate it. Our operation is not
just file servers We pull data from various satellites process it through
multiple machines, while archiving some, it's also routed to multiple other
machines. Data routing is very intertwined among various processes as to
make a "system", not just a collection of file servers that I could
distribute on the network.

I did like most of do in these situations, improvised. I will say LC while
some servers may shut down at 105, with a high, hurricane like volume of air
moving through they seem to hang in there. Just fans on the racks and fans
in the buildings open doors did not help much, just more heat than we could
push out the doors.

The only reason I outline my "mountain" solution, it keeps us going until
the primary problem is resolved. We had that ceiling cut open and a big fan
setting on the hole in under 3 hours. I'm sure it will take days to
weatherproof and secure it.

Wow, who would ever thought all that is involved to just keep a computer
running!
I guess the lesson here is Plan ahead, or you might get caught with your
pants down, and loose your shirt, literally, and not with the new secretary
!

Stay cool,
Phil

Oh, By the way LC, that fellow contacted me directly about fedora on the
older compact servers. I gave him the info to get him fixed up and he has it
going with no problems in graphics mode. If anyone needs to load fedora on
any of the older Compaq servers I'll be happy to share the tricks.
Have a good day,
Phil



"Kevin Childers" wrote in message
...
Interesting you should bring this up, I am currently working for a
company that is suffering through to an A/C failure for the entire
building
that has the server room shut down. Some joker brought in an old gas
station thermometer that was scaled to 135(F) degrees. It topped out in
under 15 minutes. As a temp solution we have moved the servers out and
distributed them around the network in what has to be one of the most
physically unsecured environments possible.

Two other sites I've worked at have had heat issues and in both cases
the key was air flow just as you have found out. In both instances heat
was
not considered during the initial establishment of the server room. Here
are the two long term solutions they came up with and the solution I have
put forward for my current position.

1. Location, one story office complex with server room in a windowless
former storage room. Just like you we cut a large hole out, but in the
back
wall. We then had installed an independent A/C unit (the same as some
cheap
motels use) with a thermal switch set at 80 degrees. Setting was found
through trial and error as we noted the A/C unit needed a bit of a head
start to keep the server room temperature below 90 degrees. Realizing
that
the ambient air temperature needed to be cooler than the max operating
temperature of the servers to provide the necessary heat transfer as it
was
pulled through the cases.

2. Location, at the top of a stair well in a split level building.
Server
room has it's own HVAC unit, but no back up. The HVAC was running 24/7/365
and the room temperature averaged around 80 degrees regardless of the
season
or the thermostats settings. Due to power availability and structural
issues, we cut a hole in the ceiling and installed a large drum fan with
ducting to carry the hot air out of the building and provide a weather
proof
system. Site is in a hurricane prone area and to date the ducting has
kept
the rain out. The only draw back is that the fan is very noisy, but then
it
is an emergency fall back system so it is not on that often. Later we
redirected an HVAC vent from a storage closet on the first floor into the
server room as a back up. The fan kept the temperature within the
operational range, but the front office didn't like the techs working in
shorts and t-shirts.

3. Location, former common/meeting room in the center (20 feet from
nearest
accessible outside wall) of a multi-story office building. They now have
some high efficiency A/C unit for home/office room additions that only
require a 3 inch opening to connect the inside and outside units. Am
proposing we install same. Local climate control folks say that the
piping
can be run with a bit of custom work on their part. With proper
insulation
there should be no problem with condensation and the unit can support the
expected heat load. This will make the server room independent of the
buildings HVAC should it fail in the future. One advantage the climate
control folks mentioned is that the replacement unit for the HVAC unit
would
need to be scaled up as the original unit was never intended to support
the
sort of heat load that the server room adds to the building. Cost wise it
comes out about even and should the server room system fail in the future
we
have the option to open up both ends of the server room and sponge off the
buildings ambient air until it can be fixed.

As a point of minor interest, the local community college uses it's
former mainframe server room as a mortuary. They long ago built a
"Technology Center" to hold their server rooms and computer labs. Until
they began teaching "Mortuary Science" the room was of little use due to
the
custom HVAC system being to cold for classrooms or offices and the being
no
heating system, the heat from the servers was ample enough.

KC


"Phil" wrote in message
...
LC,
That 105 may be the magic number, but that room was allot hotter than
that.

I'm using about 25 servers, 1850R's and dl380's with a few more odd
balls.
10 of the EU's 12 drives ea and 4 newer arrays 14 dives ea. Add the
switches, kvm, kvm extenders, ip control, multiple 3, and 6, KVA UPS's,
satellite equipment, routers, phone equipment, alarm equipment, CCTV
equipment, monitors and lighting and that's allot of heat. There is also
a
bank of transformers in a big steel cabinet that generate heat too, can
hardly touch them, they tie into the panels and backup generators.

I didn't realize it until I started counting, but over 200 scsi drives
in
that mess. Nowhere else do I have a concentration of over about 5
computers.
Already switched all my monitors out to flat screens which saved a few
bucks
on power and heat.

We cut a 5-foot hole in the roof of that small building, pulled the drop
ceiling tiles out above the racks and temporarily set a 5-foot ceiling
fan
over the cutout in the roof. That has dropped the temp considerably,
and
is
moving a hurricane like flow of air through now.

So far nothing has shut down from heat (that I know of), but this
morning
I
had 6 bix box fans blowing directly on the racks. I had already shut
some
stuff down, but some stuff has to operate regardless.

Heat, and power is one reason I was thinking about upgrading to more
modern
servers, but I question what dependability I would gain with the new
cheaper
built equipment. This stuff has worked trouble free, and does everything
I
need, just not cheap to operate and probably more dependable than new
equipment. I thought I had it set up so that any given failure would not
stop any process but 95 degrees outside is not helping. Damn, it's been
hot.

Time to redesign my layout after this. I've learned allot about server
operation, but it has been a slow evolution and a continuous learning
experience, most the hard way. We never planed to have that much "stuff"
in
there, it's been a slow process of adding equipment, so it simply wasn't
designed for.

Thanks again, for the time,
Phil

"Nut Cracker" wrote in message
...
Hello Phil,

To an extent, it depends on the models of the servers. I have never
had
a
problem with storage shutting down, and I have had that stuff running
in
some very HOT environments.

There are parts to my answer.

First, most of the systems will go into Thermal Shutdown around 105
degree's
F (internal temp). They will shut down (gracefully) until they cool
off.
At
5 minute intervals, the servers power back on to see if they have
cooled
down enough to power up and start running again.

As long as you have *some* airflow going into the front of those
machines,
and there is ample airflow to exhaust the heat that comes out of the
backs,
you should be OK until you get the HVAC system repaired.

Second, setting up the servers for a Thermal ASR (automatic server
reset)
is
an OPTION. It doesnt have to be enabled for the servers to operate. Of
course, you do so at your own risk.

If you have the system management hompage installed on your amchines,
then
you should be able go into it and tell the server whether or not you
want
Thermal Reset (or something like that) enabled.

If you have any other quetsions, I will be happy to answer them for
you.

- LC

"Phil" wrote in message
...
Nutcracker,
You are the expert, just how hot can the ambient temperature be with
theses
servers and raid enclosures be before something starts crapping out?

We lost the HVAC to the server room, we have doors open (NO windows
in
room)
multiple fans going and it's still hot as hell.

Hopefully tomorrow will have it fixed, but this heat concerns me. I
had
backups to what I thought was everything BUT the cooling. For some
reason
I
did not take that failure into consideration.

Thanks,
Phil

As long as it works for you and the price is right, it's a good
solution. Air flow around the servers is the key. Each server can cool
it's self as long as the server room's ambient air temperature is kept cool
enough for the server dump it's heat load into it without creating a rising
temperature spiral.

I was in Fayetteville NC for the first two situations I mentioned. Due
to geography, the weather there is not so kind in the summer. To low to get
any benefit from elevational cooling but low enough to get fog and high
humidity from the mixed airflow off the mountains and the ocean. Yet, to
far from the coast to get any true onshore effect. Fortunately the sand
hills drain well and are high enough to minimized storm flooding.

Best of luck

KC

"Phil" wrote in message
...
LC, Kevin,
In my case equipment is in a small (1500sf) separate concrete block
building
with foam insulated, and sheet rocked walls and no windows. We have a
4-foot
space between the drop ceiling and the roof. Roof is flat so I thought
cutting rafters would be easier, cheaper, and quicker than walls. I'm
going
to leave that fan on the roof, have a weatherproof enclosure built over
the
fan with louvers and install steel bars for security. It's a temporary
solution, but in light of a total loss of operation, it is working.

I'm up in the mountains of North Carolina and we rarely see these high
outside temperatures and can hardly justify installing two HVAC systems.
(perhaps I need to reevaluate that too) Our compressor took a nosedive and
it wasn't a simple quick fix. I've found for the most part, build a backup
to the primary "whatever" and the primary won't fail or don't prepare and
look out. I'll leave that fan on the roof, just in case, but it is working
(cross fingers) and nothing is shutting down now, although still too warm
to
comfortably work in there with clothes on!

Yesterday, prior to the hole/fan we did start having failures in some
servers. Luckily it was not all servers and the amazing thing was the
their
respective backups kept going so I didn't loose one file.

I have too much equipment to temporarily relocate it. Our operation is not
just file servers We pull data from various satellites process it through
multiple machines, while archiving some, it's also routed to multiple
other
machines. Data routing is very intertwined among various processes as to
make a "system", not just a collection of file servers that I could
distribute on the network.

I did like most of do in these situations, improvised. I will say LC while
some servers may shut down at 105, with a high, hurricane like volume of
air
moving through they seem to hang in there. Just fans on the racks and fans
in the buildings open doors did not help much, just more heat than we
could
push out the doors.

The only reason I outline my "mountain" solution, it keeps us going until
the primary problem is resolved. We had that ceiling cut open and a big
fan
setting on the hole in under 3 hours. I'm sure it will take days to
weatherproof and secure it.

Wow, who would ever thought all that is involved to just keep a computer
running!
I guess the lesson here is Plan ahead, or you might get caught with your
pants down, and loose your shirt, literally, and not with the new
secretary
!

Stay cool,
Phil

Oh, By the way LC, that fellow contacted me directly about fedora on the
older compact servers. I gave him the info to get him fixed up and he has
it
going with no problems in graphics mode. If anyone needs to load fedora on
any of the older Compaq servers I'll be happy to share the tricks.
Have a good day,
Phil



"Kevin Childers" wrote in message
...
Interesting you should bring this up, I am currently working for a
company that is suffering through to an A/C failure for the entire
building
that has the server room shut down. Some joker brought in an old gas
station thermometer that was scaled to 135(F) degrees. It topped out in
under 15 minutes. As a temp solution we have moved the servers out and
distributed them around the network in what has to be one of the most
physically unsecured environments possible.

Two other sites I've worked at have had heat issues and in both
cases
the key was air flow just as you have found out. In both instances heat
was
not considered during the initial establishment of the server room.
Here
are the two long term solutions they came up with and the solution I
have
put forward for my current position.

1. Location, one story office complex with server room in a windowless
former storage room. Just like you we cut a large hole out, but in the
back
wall. We then had installed an independent A/C unit (the same as some
cheap
motels use) with a thermal switch set at 80 degrees. Setting was found
through trial and error as we noted the A/C unit needed a bit of a head
start to keep the server room temperature below 90 degrees. Realizing
that
the ambient air temperature needed to be cooler than the max operating
temperature of the servers to provide the necessary heat transfer as it
was
pulled through the cases.

2. Location, at the top of a stair well in a split level building.
Server
room has it's own HVAC unit, but no back up. The HVAC was running
24/7/365
and the room temperature averaged around 80 degrees regardless of the
season
or the thermostats settings. Due to power availability and structural
issues, we cut a hole in the ceiling and installed a large drum fan with
ducting to carry the hot air out of the building and provide a weather
proof
system. Site is in a hurricane prone area and to date the ducting has
kept
the rain out. The only draw back is that the fan is very noisy, but
then
it
is an emergency fall back system so it is not on that often. Later we
redirected an HVAC vent from a storage closet on the first floor into
the
server room as a back up. The fan kept the temperature within the
operational range, but the front office didn't like the techs working in
shorts and t-shirts.

3. Location, former common/meeting room in the center (20 feet from
nearest
accessible outside wall) of a multi-story office building. They now
have
some high efficiency A/C unit for home/office room additions that only
require a 3 inch opening to connect the inside and outside units. Am
proposing we install same. Local climate control folks say that the
piping
can be run with a bit of custom work on their part. With proper
insulation
there should be no problem with condensation and the unit can support
the
expected heat load. This will make the server room independent of the
buildings HVAC should it fail in the future. One advantage the climate
control folks mentioned is that the replacement unit for the HVAC unit
would
need to be scaled up as the original unit was never intended to support
the
sort of heat load that the server room adds to the building. Cost wise
it
comes out about even and should the server room system fail in the
future
we
have the option to open up both ends of the server room and sponge off
the
buildings ambient air until it can be fixed.

As a point of minor interest, the local community college uses it's
former mainframe server room as a mortuary. They long ago built a
"Technology Center" to hold their server rooms and computer labs. Until
they began teaching "Mortuary Science" the room was of little use due to
the
custom HVAC system being to cold for classrooms or offices and the being
no
heating system, the heat from the servers was ample enough.

KC


"Phil" wrote in message
...
LC,
That 105 may be the magic number, but that room was allot hotter than
that.

I'm using about 25 servers, 1850R's and dl380's with a few more odd
balls.
10 of the EU's 12 drives ea and 4 newer arrays 14 dives ea. Add the
switches, kvm, kvm extenders, ip control, multiple 3, and 6, KVA
UPS's,
satellite equipment, routers, phone equipment, alarm equipment, CCTV
equipment, monitors and lighting and that's allot of heat. There is
also
a
bank of transformers in a big steel cabinet that generate heat too,
can
hardly touch them, they tie into the panels and backup generators.

I didn't realize it until I started counting, but over 200 scsi drives
in
that mess. Nowhere else do I have a concentration of over about 5
computers.
Already switched all my monitors out to flat screens which saved a few
bucks
on power and heat.

We cut a 5-foot hole in the roof of that small building, pulled the
drop
ceiling tiles out above the racks and temporarily set a 5-foot ceiling
fan
over the cutout in the roof. That has dropped the temp considerably,
and
is
moving a hurricane like flow of air through now.

So far nothing has shut down from heat (that I know of), but this
morning
I
had 6 bix box fans blowing directly on the racks. I had already shut
some
stuff down, but some stuff has to operate regardless.

Heat, and power is one reason I was thinking about upgrading to more
modern
servers, but I question what dependability I would gain with the new
cheaper
built equipment. This stuff has worked trouble free, and does
everything
I
need, just not cheap to operate and probably more dependable than new
equipment. I thought I had it set up so that any given failure would
not
stop any process but 95 degrees outside is not helping. Damn, it's
been
hot.

Time to redesign my layout after this. I've learned allot about server
operation, but it has been a slow evolution and a continuous learning
experience, most the hard way. We never planed to have that much
"stuff"
in
there, it's been a slow process of adding equipment, so it simply
wasn't
designed for.

Thanks again, for the time,
Phil

"Nut Cracker" wrote in message
...
Hello Phil,

To an extent, it depends on the models of the servers. I have never
had
a
problem with storage shutting down, and I have had that stuff
running
in
some very HOT environments.

There are parts to my answer.

First, most of the systems will go into Thermal Shutdown around 105
degree's
F (internal temp). They will shut down (gracefully) until they cool
off.
At
5 minute intervals, the servers power back on to see if they have
cooled
down enough to power up and start running again.

As long as you have *some* airflow going into the front of those
machines,
and there is ample airflow to exhaust the heat that comes out of the
backs,
you should be OK until you get the HVAC system repaired.

Second, setting up the servers for a Thermal ASR (automatic server
reset)
is
an OPTION. It doesnt have to be enabled for the servers to operate.
Of
course, you do so at your own risk.

If you have the system management hompage installed on your
amchines,
then
you should be able go into it and tell the server whether or not you
want
Thermal Reset (or something like that) enabled.

If you have any other quetsions, I will be happy to answer them for
you.

- LC

"Phil" wrote in message
...
Nutcracker,
You are the expert, just how hot can the ambient temperature be
with
theses
servers and raid enclosures be before something starts crapping
out?

We lost the HVAC to the server room, we have doors open (NO
windows
in
room)
multiple fans going and it's still hot as hell.

Hopefully tomorrow will have it fixed, but this heat concerns me.
I
had
backups to what I thought was everything BUT the cooling. For some
reason
I
did not take that failure into consideration.

Thanks,
Phil

On Mon, 25 Jul 2005 16:59:43 -0400, Phil wrote:

Nutcracker,
You are the expert, just how hot can the ambient temperature be with theses
servers and raid enclosures be before something starts crapping out?

We lost the HVAC to the server room, we have doors open (NO windows in room)
multiple fans going and it's still hot as hell.

Hopefully tomorrow will have it fixed, but this heat concerns me. I had
backups to what I thought was everything BUT the cooling. For some reason I
did not take that failure into consideration.

Thanks,
Phil




Although your servers may not fail right now, running them at a higher
tempature stresses them quite a lot.

You may see higher than usual drive failures, etc, for the next few months.
If
you were thinking of buying new equipment, you should probably do so
sooner rather than later.


Aidan Grey

Keep in mind that the temerature of you server room has
to be lower at higher altitudes to get the same cooling.

Altitude derating factor:
FEET METERS COOLING:
0 0 100%
1,000 3,000 95%
1,500 5,000 90%
2,000 7,000 86%
3,000 10,000 80%
3,500 12,000 75%