Q: What is Efficiency Without Compromise?
A: Efficiency Without Compromise is a path to optimize data center infrastructure for design, operating and management efficiency while maintaining or improving—and not sacrificing—availability. This is achieved through the proper utilization of cooling, power and monitoring technologies in addition to key services.
Q: Are there some real-life examples of efficiency with compromise?
A: Unfortunately, yes. With hourly downtime in the 5-6 digits, some firms have not hardened their environments properly, and lost significant revenue, profit and goodwill during computing outages that could have been prevented. Others have not yet fully realized the CAPEX savings from optimizing IT space, given $200-400/s.f. data center construction costs. Many firms do not manage ghost servers effectively, wasting space and energy. Others have struggled to deploy would-be energy-saving efforts that actually increased failure rates, and lead to greater problems.
Q: Is Efficiency Without Compromise a standard design?
A: Efficiency Without Compromise is not a set of rote recommendations, but instead involves four areas of opportunity within a data center infrastructure that directly impact efficiency and availability. Within each area, there are technologies that, when applied appropriately, can cut data center design and deployment time, reduce operating costs, and enhance management and planning success, all while maintaining or improving data center availability.
Q: What are the four key elements?
A: Efficiency Without Compromise is achieved by capitalizing on one of more of the following:
- Infrastructure management
- High density
- Flex capacity
- Eco availability
Q: Is Efficiency Without Compromise just about products and saving energy?
A: No. Recent industry discussions focus almost exclusively on energy efficiency—neglecting the broader issues of a data center’s lifecycle. Efficiency Without Compromise is all about leveraging the benefits of Emerson’s expertise in design, operations and management to positively impact overall data center efficiency, while also enhancing availability. Energy savings is critical, but IT initiatives employing it must be balanced.
Q: What are the lifecycle phases of the data center?
A: Emerson Network Power empowers data center lifecycles, moving beyond operational energy improvements. Unique services, solutions and expert advice improve efficiency and ensures availability within three key phases:
- Design and Deployment
- Operations
- Management and Planning
Q: What is Eco Availability?
A: Eco Availability is focused on achieving the right balance between availability and efficiency, particularly where efficiency-driven improvements could negatively impact IT business performance. Data center managers are challenged to implement an electrical scheme that achieves the highest possible efficiency while still delivering availability goals.
Q: Explain the High Density opportunity?
A: High-density environments house rack densities between 10-60kW. The escalation of rack and room densities has a direct correlation with efficiency: the higher the density, the greater the efficiency. Organizations that can increase density, while providing high availability, can operate at higher efficiency levels. They also increase the computing capacity of their current facility—avoiding or delaying the need for new data centers.
Q: What is the Flex Capacity opportunity?
A: Flex capacity encompasses solutions that efficiently allow a data center infrastructure to dynamically adapt to the IT environment. Technologies such as variable speed drives, digital scroll compressors, Softscale UPS scalability, and iCOM controls all enable enhanced levels of dynamic flexibility, in the quest to match reliable infrastructure systems to IT system loads.
Q: Explain Infrastructure Management?
A: Infrastructure management pulls everything together by applying Emerson’s data center expertise with product and service offerings in monitoring and management solutions – including Liebert and Aperture. This leads to improved IT infrastructure performance and uptime.
Q: How do customers benefit by adopting the Efficiency Without Compromise approach?
A: Data center professionals will see benefits throughout the lifecycle of their facility by embracing the opportunities provided by Efficiency Without Compromise. Leveraging pre-engineered solutions and high-density architectures can reduce the time required for system deployment, as well as space and capital requirements. IT facilities can apply efficient technologies to reduce operational energy costs, and decrease downtime costs using high-availability configurations. Lastly, enhanced management and planning systems can streamline data center operations with comprehensive management controls, and lower long-term operational costs via proactive maintenance programs.
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