Comment Build lab? (Score 1) 52
Your goals here are make it quick and easy to get stuff out of the box, configured, and back out the door as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Things I'd do to start:
If doing racks, consider shelves so you can slide equipment in and out quickly. Some racks will let you do shelves that mount to the sides rather than taking up 1U for a shelf, these may let you get more density in the rack and need fewer racks.
If doing shelves, don't stack equipment, try to put it like books on end, makes it a lot easier to get one piece out without moving a bunch of others.
Plenty of power cords/outlets where you need it, make sure if everything isn't a C13 that you account for this. Newer switches are starting to use C15s or C19s for larger equipment. Make sure you have a large enough UPS to handle startup current for all these devices. Constantly turning up/down equipment is hell on your power feeds, good clean UPS power is important.
Patch cables wired in and velcro'ed off to the rack where you need them, and run extras. That way if you have a suspected bad cable or a broken end you aren't worrying about replacing it right away to get the equipment out the door.
Terminal servers are a godsend in an environment like that. Configure them so you know that TS1, port 1 is the top (or bottom) device in the rack. Keep them in order or you'll be tearing your hair out why the wrong device just rebooted.
As someone else mentioned, USB barcode scanners if you have to do any kind of inventory tracking is a GREAT tool to have.
Separate but adjacent boxing/unboxing room with a sturdy table. And a sturdy cart to move equipment back and forth between them. You want to keep all the cardboard and styrofoam out of the equipment config area.
