Protect Your Electronic Equipment Investment
When most people think about protecting their data they probably think about cyber attacks and hackers. But, it is just as important to physically protect your data and phone equipment from the environment. Heat, dust, and power issues are the main problems in data rooms, big and small. Humidity or water from nearby pipes and gases, or smoke, from nearby manufacturing or production areas are concerns as well.
Another huge problem for protecting voice/data equipment and equipment rooms are door locks. Making sure the equipment room has proper locks with limited availability prevents unauthorized access.
What are the effects of even one piece of equipment going down: dead equipment, the cost of replacement, employee down time, the loss of production and the potential loss of customers.
Steps to help in case of emergency outage:
1) Having an emergency plan in place-maybe the most important thing. Do you know where you can find a replacement part? Is it an overnight ship or stocked local? Is it something you should have a back-up of at your site? Do you know the life expectancy of that particular piece of equipment? What is the equipment warranty and what does it cover?
2) Make sure your vendors/installers contact information is easy to find. Have a label on the equipment or rack or backboard that has all of their contact information. Find out what your vendors emergency response time is to evaluate how quickly they can remote or on site service the issue.
3) Work with your vendors/installers to make sure you have a list of all equipment, including manufacturer’s part numbers to make it easier to locate for replacement.
4) Label each piece of equipment so they are easy for even a lay person to locate and access. Label each connecting cable as well so they are easy to determine where they are supposed to go.
5) Invest in a UPS or surge suppressor for all equipment to protect against dirty power, power spikes and fluctuations and brown outs.
6) Make sure all equipment that is supposed to be grounded, is properly grounded to the main building ground.
7) Keep power cables labeled and organized so they are not easily tripped over or can easily become unplugged.
8) Keep the equipment room clean and tidy and limit access to prevent dust from kicking up. Blow or vacuum dust from equipment. It will collect at any cooling fan intake.
9) Install drip pans in ceiling below any pipe fittings or valves.
10) Install environmental sensors in equipment room to notify or alarm when environmental conditions change.
11) Install thermometers at different rack levels and near other equipment to monitor equipment temperatures.
12) Invest in cooling methods like air conditioning units if the equipment room is too hot.
At ECS we have seen it all. Dirty and dust filled equipment rooms at a hospital. Phone equipment installed right next to a mop sink. Equipment plugged into power connected to a light switch for the room so when the light switch goes off, so does the customer’s equipment. Extension cords used to feed racks and backboards. It is important to keep in mind that some of this can negate a warranty.
One can’t guarantee 100% reliability 100% of the time, but, by doing even a few preventative measures one can prolong the life of their equipment investment and shorten the length of downtime.
Ask ECS about an equipment room assessment today.
(Article by Charles Bressler – ECS Account Manager)