Data Center Monitoring

Abstract

Since the early days of data centers, the data center operators have been challenged with device placement, capacity planning, equipment maintenance, and failure & downtime. Lately, things have become even harder for them due to the spotlight on low energy efficiency and low utilization of available capacity. The idea is that more needs to be done with less, while maintaining the same level of service. While piecemeal and inadequate attempts have been made from time to time, to address some of these challenges, the key to solving all of these problems lies in combining IT and facility monitoring, or even just facility monitoring. Therefore, in this chapter, first we briefly discuss some of the aforementioned issues. Then we get into the details of what physical quantities should be monitored in a data center and what value that can bring. We focus on the cooling distribution chain and the power distribution chain. Since power monitoring is a very popular topic and a major portion of it deals with power quality, a separate section has been dedicated on brief explanations of different power quality issues. Finally, we discuss the requirements for the software infrastructure that is needed to support this type of holistic monitoring.