We came across an interesting piece in TechRadar.com called “The Dangers of Dirt in the Data Centre” written by Mark Say. The title caught our eye as it was clearly highlighting the importance of cleanliness in a data centre.
The article begins with the statement that the average data centre may appear to be a sterile environment, but there are indeed threats in the air. These threats include dust, particles of human hair, dead skin, wool and artificial fibres. All of these can get into servers and clog up the heat sinks on sensitive chips and result in overheating and early chip death.
Gases can also cause damage to a data centre which will affect the performance of equipment, increase energy consumption and sometimes even threaten the loss of data.
When improper techniques and tools are used to clean a data centre these can often make things worse. Mr. Simon Campbell-Whyte of the Data Centre Alliance (DCA) was quoted: “At one time most data centres were connected to offices and the regular cleaners would do it, but now they are high powered with sophisticated cooling systems and need a specialist to come in and clean them properly. They should know what they can clean and what they should leave alone.”
He added: “There are risks that the data centre is not applying the right cleaning strategy; it could be an office cleaner doing the job.” He goes on to explain why this type of mission critical service should be left to the experts who are experienced and follow concise guidelines and practices.
As experts in the field of high tech precision cleaning solutions for mission critical environments such as computer rooms and data centres, we applaud this initiative.
For the full article please see: The Dangers of Dirt in the Data Centre