Is Data Center
Airflow
Still a Mystery?
By Jose ruiz
Is data center airflow still a mystery? To be blunt, only if you let it be. Although
not everyone who operates a data center is a physicist or expert in fluid
dynamics, they do have access to a variety of products that do the heavy
lifting. Despite this plethora of available tools to help you identify areas in your
data center that are hot enough to smelt metal, a romp through any number
of "mission critical" facilities will uncover a healthy complement of empty
metal racks being bathed in the cool breezes delivered from the perforated
tiles surrounding them. Since many readers will be "shocked…shocked" that
this level of optimum-airflow apostasy still exists in many shrines to compute
and storage, it's helpful to examine how and why many of our data center
peers remain in a state of "airflow mystification."
14 | THE DATA CENTER JOURNAL
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