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PRECONFIGURED INFRASRTUCTURE
locations are temporary or short term, realising an ROI may
often prove difficult.
Creating a room that has a suitable power infrastructure,
climate control, security and so on can become a major
part of switching on a new location, whether that be office
space, factory or logistics facility. Preconfigured cabinets
can be delivered to site prebuilt with all of the attributes
of a traditional data centre or server room. This means
building modifications are minimised and in many cases
eliminated all together. In a leased location these benefits
are doubled when the lease ends and the facility has to be
returned to its original state. When designed and deployed
correctly, cabinets and physical infrastructure within are
far less obtrusive to the building. If leased, this leads to
significant cost savings both at the beginning and end of a
lease period.
Because infrastructure services are integrated into the
cabinet this also means that they become redeployable
assets enabling a greater ROI; components such as cabling
and HVAC plant which are often disposed of at the end of
a lease, are easily moved, as part of the cabinet, to a new
location. From an accountant’s perspective, this definitely
ticks boxes.
From a design point of view, the concept of preconfigured
cabinets also makes life a lot easier. With defined
configurations for switch, compute and cabling distribution
cabinets a building block approach can be taken, things
like lengths for inter-cabinet truck cables become a known
quantity from the outset, leading to a greater degree of
precision, faster deployment and improved adherence to
best practices.
IT assets from particles, contaminants and fluctuating
power quality. Outdoors, protection from the elements and
unwanted human interference is required.
Preconfigured cabinets for edge computing, as well as
integrating physical infrastructure services, should isolate
the IT assets from the outside environment and vice versa.
In an office environment, staff need to be protected from
noise and heat created by the IT assets. And in a factory
environment, IT assets need to be protected against air
contaminated with particles and chemicals?
Another challenge presented by the move to the edge is
the fact that IT assets often need to be located in places
that are not designed to house them. Organisations are
faced with the prospect of having to make environments
fit for purpose. This is usually expensive. As many of these
Summary
While preconfigured cabinets bring limited value when
deployed in purpose-built white space, once out at the edge
the concept solves a number of very real challenges while
also reducing costs. The case for preconfigured cabinets in
edge data centres is a strong one. Cabinets that come pre-
fitted with connectivity infrastructure, power distribution,
cable management and raceway, cooling, fire suppression
and rack monitoring functionality – all based on the client‘s
specific IT needs – enable organisations to deploy services
rapidly, using a single physical infrastructure platform.
This incorporates multiple services without having to
consider interoperability, working with multiple vendors and
managing concurrent installation works, often in sensitive
environments.
From a financial perspective, preconfigured cabinets
offer a number of compelling benefits. When designed and
deployed correctly, the cabinets and physical infrastructure
within are far less obtrusive to the building. If leased, this
leads to significant cost savings both at the beginning
and end of a lease period. A modular approach at all levels
means preconfigured cabinets are assets which can easily
be redeployed as needed, increasing the potential ROI. This
scope is likely to increase as IoT and technologies like 5G
open up opportunities for new applications that require local
compute capabilities. n
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