Server Cooling Solution for Small Business? 70
An anonymous reader asks: "What cheap yet effective cooling solutions are available for servers for a small business? Keep in mind, I don't mean a small 100 employee business but rather 10 full time employees. The place is based out of an ex-residential unit, outfitted for the business. As with any small business, there wasn't any real consideration for IT needs when the place was built. The organization is getting its first real in-house server and all rooms within the unit are already in use, meaning the server must live nicely in office space, with humans, where the existing switch is. The organization follows a policy of turning off PCs and air-conditioning out of hours and in the Australian summer, the unit easily heats up past 35 degrees Celsius, exceeding the maximum operating ambient temperature for the server. Now, I can convince them of leaving the air-conditioner on, but the humans may not want the room as cool as I want it for the server and it's difficult to ensure that no one has turned it off. Are there any other cheap yet effective cooling solutions for a small business where the budget is extremely limited?"
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A fridge is just an insulated box. It has a heat pump (coils/fans/compressor/etc) that removes heat from the box. It doesn't do this very fast, but it doesn't have to as when the door is closed, the insulation prevents much heat from coming in. So when you close the door, the heat pump removes enough heat to get it to its set temperature then shuts off, coming back on as needed. However when on, this heat pump can only pump heat at a certain rate.
A computer
Portable Air-Conditioner (Score:4, Informative)
Stick the server in it's own closet. Use a portable air-conditioner to cool the room as low as you want. Have the heat exhaust into the rest of the building.
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The option of cutting up a fridge isn't bad really, as long as you can controll the humidity issues that result. The truth is that the humidity will remain low as long as you don't store foodstuff in it. The
COP (Score:2)
Phil
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Yeah, been there, done that.
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Server Closet! (Score:3, Interesting)
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Be sure to properly size the AC unit. An AC unit over capacity will short cycle and have reliability issues. An undersize unit may run all the time and not cycle off long enough to properly defrost itself leading up to ice blocked airflow. If you are in a high humidity location, then look for a unit which can bypass or reheat some air to lower the humidity. Some room AC units in trying to reach high effeciency do n
do not worry (Score:3, Informative)
Define "cheap" (Score:3, Interesting)
If you are in an ex-residential space then there is most likely a garage or utility room/closet that you can use for things such as your network switch, telephone, PBX, servers, etc. Why not put your server there and install a small air conditioner.
I have a friend who runs a small business out of his home. He uses a spare bedroom as an office and made the bedroom closet his server room. He installed a split-unit air conditioner [samsung.com] to keep the closet cool.
Just run the AC (Score:3, Interesting)
You could outsource everything, use one of those Internet based backup services. Or co-locate a server someplace and rsync all your desktops data to it nightly.
If they're not keen on Air Conditioning a large office all the time, is there a closet you can take for a server room? You just need enough room for a server and AC unit. If the area doesn't have an outside wall for a standard wall AC unit, consider a portable AC unit, where the heat exhaust could be piped outside via normal ducting.
Other than that, run it over spec, keep good backups, and make sure management knows by not taking care of the environment, they're being penny wise and pound foolish.
The solution . . . (Score:1)
Get a fridge (Score:3, Funny)
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Check the BTU rating of said fridge before purchase. Most small fridges are designed to 1 cool warm objects placed inside and remove the heat that leaks inside from the outside. To do both of these jobs a small capacity cooling system is used. If your computer can produce heat faster than the cooling system can remove it, the temprature
just clean it regularly and you'll be fine (Score:3, Informative)
First... (Score:5, Informative)
More practically, you want to seal it off by itself (heavy curtains or folding partitions may be enough), the turn an AC on inside the mini-room, and threaten anyone who turns it off. I went through years of this at a former job, where the U maintained that cooling wasn't infrastructure, so our cluster's cooling was our problem. We used a portable unit for a while (and just vented the heat into the ceiling tiles, so the people above us had a warm floor), but eventually the answer was take over controllable space, and install a Liebert cold-water recirculating unit, as well as having the building airflow modified. Expensive, but we needed that headroom. Your situation is much smaller, so a closet with its own chiller and guaranteed air-circulation should do it. (Presuming, of course, that by 'server' you mean '1 to 2 proc Intel box pulling 500W max', rather than, 'I'm sharing an office with an E10K because we have nowhere else to put it.")
Rule 1 of Offices: the most expensive member sets the temperature
Rule 2 of Offices: the business data is more expensive than even a bunch of employees.
I wouldn't worry about it. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I wouldn't worry about it. -- So True.. (Score:2, Informative)
Use GOOD FANS(dual ball bearing
Squirrel Cage Blower (Score:1)
Return air vent (Score:5, Insightful)
Most people think that cooling computers has more to do with offering cold air to them, but it's actually all about removing the hot air that they're producing.
Simple and effective.
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When I turn on my render farm at home I open the glass door and put a custom stack of box fans in pointing out. I turn them on and fire up the render farm. After several experiments I found this to be an optimal solution. In the winter I don't open the door
In the peak summer temps (100+) I don't render between 1:00pm and midnight. Since the inital query was for a switch and a server (Even if it is an E10K as someone else mentioned) The closet with it's own AC should work fine, and sans that a
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Honestly I really don't see the problem. For a small company run out of an old house we are talking about just one or two servers max.
I would suggest they spend a little extra money and get a good Intel or AMD server that support the vanderpool or pacifica.
Put Xen on it and use v
AC options (Score:2)
Thing is, you pay now or pay later. Scrimp on co
You need a server room... (Score:2)
Box Fans? (Score:2)
Just make sure they are on high or medium and you should be fine...
It works for keeping a human cool, why not servers?
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It works for keeping a human cool, why not servers?
Servers don't sweat. Unless you plan on misting your servers with spray bottles regularly, evaprotive cooling is useless.
it's not necessary for the server room to be cold (Score:2)
Also, it is advisable you schedule maintenance, perhaps on a quarterly basis, to remove the cover and vaccuum out the accumilated dust as you're going to be in a much dustier environment than your average data center.
The other bit that is more
Ghetto-cheap (Score:2)
So 95F, that's pretty warm.
Here is the SUPER cheap way. In the US, you can get a window unit air conditioner for under $100 US. Hook up some hoses and direct air directly into the server. Might have to open a panel or cut a hole in it. If you don't want to damage the server by cutting a whole in it, remove the panel and tape a piece of carboard over it to seal the air in (well, not seal, but at least allow the therma
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Where are the vast majority of Slashdot readers from? Vast majority of internet users for that matter?
It was tongue-in-cheek to ask him to use fahrenheit, don't get all bent out of shape, asshole.
Population wise we may be a small drop in the bucket, but we are a large part of the global economy (for better or worse, my opinion leads toward worse).
I don't see your dumb-ass coming up with any solution. My solution acknowledged his need to provide cooling to a server on
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As for metric, maybe if we had done it earlier last century, it would have been easy; but we are an arrogant bunch. I work in finance. It doesn't affect me either way. I know metric is sane. But there is a tremendous monetary cost involved in switching. May as well switch everyone to Dvorak while we're at it, for the amount of discomfort it would cause.
My only experience with buying air conditioners is in the US, for $100. I COULD go look up the conversion rate, but then I don't know anything about loc
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Unless you already ordered the hardware (Score:2)
http://voodoopc.blogspot.com/ [blogspot.com]
Then you just need a couple fans to cool your hard drives
You don't need air conditioning... (Score:1)
Humidity is the worst thing for machines, so maybe keep a dehumidifier handy if dampness is an issue.
Keep them clean,
Good cooling methods (Score:1)
Or... a much better idea, the Ion Cooler [engadget.com].
Careful (Score:2)
We used one in a server room
Then we brought the people responsible for controlling the $$ into the server room for a 10 minute show-off. Oh, with the A/C unit off. And we explained how the A/C unit shut off with every little power spike (which we had 2 of during the meeting). The meeting
Keeping Server cool (Score:2, Informative)
In the winter we don't need to use it air con at all, in
What kind of "server" ? (Score:4, Insightful)
If the machine is rack based (probably not, but just in case), you're going to be fighting an uphill battle to even have it in the same room as working people from about ten seconds after you first power it on.
If it's a tower machine, then it's just a PC and needs no additional cooling that your existing PCs don't already have. If it's a 'home brand' PC, just make sure the case has large, slow-spinning fans and the machine's various vents aren't right next to solid objects that will obstruct airflow out of the case. You might also want to make sure the intake fans/vents have some dust filters.
Also, make sure you're using RAID (with either a hot spare or replacement drive *on hand*) and backing up regularly. Outside of extraordinary circumstances a hard disk will be the first (and only) thing in the machine that dies, probably 12 - 18 months after you first power it up.
I say this all as an Australian who has looked after the same sort of IT infrastructure you're talking about in the same sort of climate. Indeed, my own home server has 12x7200rpm drives and dual 2.4Ghz Xeons in a large tower case with little more than 12cm fans blowing air directly over the drives and a single 12cm fan exhausting out the back - I keep an automated eye on it with various monitoring tools and even on a hot day like today (where it is 35), the drives are only sitting at 39 - 41 degrees.
The short version is that you're not going to have any heat-related problems with a single (or even several, if they're reasonably well spaced) tower-style machine in an already airconditioned room.
seal it...cool it. (Score:1)
With the supplies and cost for something like this you'll save over somekind of per server solution. I would literally buy someething like the $100 AC unit Wal-mart has and setup a space just large enough for a rack. Nuthin' fancy.
KISS forget A/c (Score:1)
Dedicated A/c is not absolutely necessary.
Just have somewhere for the _hot_ exhaust air from your server to go so that the room does not heat up while the office is closed & the room A/c is off.
The ambient air sucked into the sever will be enough to cool it s long as the hotter exhast is ducted out of the room.
Household clothes dryers have exhaust duct kits available for them for the same reason... are you getting a hint here??
Buy a cheap duct kit, send the hot air ou
Basement (Score:1)
Around here in the good old US of A, putting a few servers in a basement works well.
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I forgot to mention in my other post (Score:2)
Air *flow* is much more important than air *temperature*. A machine in a room with an ambient temp of 30 - 35 degrees, but with good airflow through the case (and most importantly over the drives) is better than a machine in a room with an ambient for 20 - 25 degrees, but no airflow.
You need "plenum volume" for outages and low cost (Score:2)
Many machine rooms and all houses are designed for fewer pieces of hot equipment than are common now, which has repeatedly led me to
The large-room trick also means that if you use a local air conditioner, it doe
Use the PC's exhaust heat for office hot water. (Score:1)
Plumb in an air-to-water heat pump [powertech-solar.com]. Instead of contributing to global warming by just tossing the exhaust heat outside the building, you're recycling the PC's unwanted waste.
If your office was once residential, it might even be easier to fit than air-con, and the business should end up paying less for the energy.
Cooling, noise and all that jazz (Score:2, Informative)
Similar situation here... (Score:1)
The extractor is on the UPS while th