– Kurt Crisman, marketing manager with Network Technologies, Inc.(www.networktechinc.com), says:

Temperature, humidity, and other factors can impact data centers, telecom switching sites, and other POP sites. In a many businesses, three groups monitor environmental threats to data center and switching site equipment: network administrators or operations managers, security personnel, and maintenance employees. Often, particularly in a small or mid-sized business, monitoring of equipment may be performed by staff onsite or visiting equipment in remote locations. However, these monitoring practices may be putting critical business operations at risk.

  • Damage caused by the environment can be subtle, unseen, or attributed to other causes. Condensation, rust, and heat damage is usually hidden inside machines, out of human sight.
  • The frequency and quality of a site check may vary from person to person. Even if procedures and schedules are in place, adherence to those procedures and schedules may vary.
  • Environment threats occur 24 hours a day, seven days a week. But staff is not always on site. Depending on staffing levels and schedules, environments can be unmonitored up to seventy percent of the time during an average week.
  • Without a log of changing conditions—temperature and humidity levels constantly increase and decrease—administrators and managers cannot identify problems caused by these changes. These problems can continue for days or months, while time and money is wasted investigating false causes and solutions.
  • As soon as you have people checking on equipment or performing maintenance, you can actually create problems where they hadn’t existed before. For example, boxes set in front of vents “temporarily” are not moved.

An effective server environment monitoring system addresses the weaknesses in the current practice of having personnel monitor the environment.

Network Technologies, inc. offers a range of server environment monitoring solutions that monitor critical environmental conditions that can destroy network components in a server room or POP site. When a sensor exceeds a configurable threshold, the system will notify the selected administrators/staff via email, SNMP traps, Web-page alerts and a visual indicator (LED). The systems connect to your IP network, so they can be configured and monitored from any workstation with a Web browser. Event-triggered snapshots from an IP Camera can be sent by email.

Our products provide the following benefits:

  • Control costs – In a stable environment, equipment lasts longer, and less equipment is damaged and needs replaced. Typically, the savings from not having to replace equipment can pay for the cost of the monitoring system.
  • Increase lead-time to fix a problem – The earlier the warning alarm sounds, the sooner personnel can solve the problem before it becomes a disaster.
  • Reduce downtime – Hardware housed at the recommended environmental conditions operates more efficiently, while also shutting down less frequently. Consequently, employees stay productive, and e-commerce sites continue to generate revenue.
  • Log environmental data for greater insight – In order to maintain stable conditions in the server room, administrators must have accurate records of what has happened. Logging is also critical for investigating problems.