Top Five Data Center Issues: DCIM To the Rescue

#3 Capacity Planning

It’s no secret that many data center managers lack the systems visibility to determine if their facilities are truly running at peak capacity.  Traditionally, operators have left plenty of room for error so uptime isn’t interrupted—a strategy known as “capacity safety gap,” or “over-provisioning.”  This strategy wastes hundreds of thousands of dollars of unused space – not to mention wasting power and cooling.  In a day and age of CFOs deferring capital expenditure budgets, many data center managers’ expectations of having additional data center construction have been unfulfilled, leaving about 30 percent of data center managers worried about running out of capacity.

Using a DCIM solution, data center operators can pinpoint where they have unused physical, power and  cooling capacity, allowing these to be planned and optimized, without overloading or exceeding power, space or cooling limitations.  This will allow the data center to be used to its full potential – and stretching the capacity of existing infrastructure can save tens or hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars in construction of additional space.

#2 Performance Management

One of the greatest challenges facing data center operators is ensuring that power and cooling is operating at its highest energy efficiency.  One of the best methods to maintain this accuracy is via accessing a real-time data source that provides up-to-the-minute metrics such as Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) and Data Center Infrastructure Efficiency (DCiE).

DCIM is a powerful ally when tracking the energy efficiency of almost every data center aspect from individual circuits to HVACs.  Using a DCIM solution, operators can automatically collect all power, cooling and infrastructure data.  This allows them to view both real-time and energy performance trending.  DCIM also provides analytics and views at the server, rack, room, data center facility, regional or global levels.  With this insight, operators can compare rack-to-rack, room-to-room, site-to-site, and total portfolio energy and operational performance as well as identifying the most-inefficient areas.  They can also identify the performance efficiency of almost every component within the power and cooling chain.

#1 Real-Time Reporting
Without a real-time reporting system, operators may find it a challenge to make informed decisions.  Simply put:  Manual readings taken weeks ago on a static report are no longer valid for today’s complex data center operations – where workloads, power consumption and temperatures vary widely throughout the day, and from day to day.

Up-to-the minute information also allows for the optimization of power loads and overall capacity trending.  Additionally, a dashboard view that spans across various monitoring and control systems is a necessity for accurately tracking energy efficiency across single rooms, complete floors, an entire data center  or multiple data centers—domestically and globally. With a browser-based DCIM solution, anyone from the boardroom to the control room to access operational views of the entire data center.

In conclusion, the continuing proliferation of applications, data and platforms such as mobile devices will ensure that data centers will continue to grow.  This, in turn, will strain the data center’s processing power and drain enormous additional amounts of energy from the grid.  As data centers evolve, so too should the tools that manage them.  The antiquated methods of storing vital operational data within individual software “silos” impedes the efforts of data center facility managers and IT managers to optimize their operations properly and avoid potential downtime.  The use of DCIM tools will greatly aid all parties tasked with data center operations and help ensure the continued flow of information.

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