After 15 years of rapid growth, the CM Technology Group decided to build a new data centre as existing facilities could no longer meet their needs.
The west Australian company's hosted services director Mia Filpo said the group wanted technology that was both reliable and secure to attract high calibre clients to their business.
Filpo said the old data centre environment did not meet security requirements or backup power and cooling needs.
“We were unable to remotely monitor our old data centre infrastructure and relied on alerts from the IT Infrastructure. In addition, there was no fire protection, which meant that if we thought something had gone wrong, we had to physically be at the old site to check it. This was both costly and time consuming,” she said.
The company was also having problems maintaining precise temperature in the old data centre and faced high electricity costs as a result, so correct cooling of equipment was also a priority.
The new data centre occupies 140m2 of floor space, with a capacity to house 56 racks. The facility is constructed using fire resistant material and a smart card security system has been installed to track access to the data centre.
Working with Schneider Electric, the data centre has been designed as a scalable solution so that as CM Technology Group’s clients grow so can the facilities.
Schneider Electric Symmetra PX250 uninterruptible power supplies (UPS) have been used in the build to enable a seamless transition from mains power to generator power, should an interruption occur. Schneider Electric InRow Chilled Water cooling units have been positioned in the middle of the data rack rows to keep the racks running optimally, and Perimeter Uniflair Chilled Water cooling units are also being used.
The room itself is kept cool thanks to Schneider Electric’s Hot Aisle Containment System (HACS). HACS encloses the hot aisle, collecting the hot exhaust air from the IT equipment. The hot air is then ducted into a computer room air handler (CRAH), providing around 40 per cent more savings than a cold-aisle system.
"By preventing the hot air from circulating in the room, we can reduce our cooling costs across the facility, thereby reducing our long term running costs," Filpo said.
To ensure everything is running correctly, Schneider Electric StruxureWare for Data Centres has been installed at the facility.
This overarching system will allow CM Technology Group to conserve, optimise and manage the data centre effectively both from the site and via remote access.
The software is able to generate dozens of relevant key performance metrics, such as power usage effectiveness (PUE) and provide graphical representations of electrical, mechanical and IT equipment to ensure comprehensive and intuitive usability.
It also provides analysis to identify excess capacity and indicates which devices can either be decommissioned or used elsewhere.
This is particularly useful for CM Technology Group as they scale up their operations. The company can also use the software to allocate operating costs to their clients and provide appropriate charge backs.