THE EFFECTS OF TEMPERATURE AND RELATIVE HUMIDITY ON EXPOSURE OF LEGACY AND FUTURE TECHNOLOGY HARDWARE, UNDER REAL DATA CENTER CONDITIONS IN AN ANSI/ISA CLASSIFIED G2 ENVIRONMENT
Abstract
It is well established that it is safe to operate information technology (IT) equipment in a G1 classified contaminant severity level when operating within specified ASHRAE recommended and allowable limits in an air-side economizer data center. This is basis for which electronic equipment manufacturers provide warranty for their products. IT equipment manufacturers in the US now requires data centers operators to demonstrate that they meet all the specified conditions consistently before fulfilling warranty equipment failure. This places limitation to where data center utilizing air-side economizer can be located. In order to determine the reliability of electronic hardware in higher severity conditions field data obtained in real data center conditions are required.
A 30-day corrosion classification coupon experiments was carried out on an experimental data center jointly owned by EMNSPC and Mestex Industries located in an industrial area in Dallas. Results of the 30-day experiments working under the operating conditions with notable excursions outside the allowable ASHRAE envelope show a G2 contaminant severity level for that time of the year. Furthermore the data center was operated until a failure was recorded on one of the hardware installed. The damaged hardware and other hardware were evaluated and compared with same hardware operated in a G1 severity environment. This was determined to be a non-corrosion related failure that occurred after 3622 hours of operation on two power density units (PDU’s). Selected components within the data center were evaluated after 4320 hours. The evaluation did not reveal any corrosion degradation that might suggest, that their reliability was affected during the entire 4320 hours of data center operations/experiments in the classified G2 environment. These results suggest a timeline for the safe operation of ITE’s in a G2 classified environment.