Mini-Data Center Data Vault Layout

Mini-Data Center Data Vault Layout
A Data Vault or DV is a tightly configured mini-data center that is highly scalable. A DV's most distinguishing feature is that the network cabinets make up the walls of the vault for air handling/cooling purposes. These DV's sit within a larger room. Voids in the wall and above cabinets are blocked with adjustable 1/4th inch honeycomb aluminum walls. Cooling air is only permitted to pass through active equipment cooling ports. Unused rack unit slots are blocked with cabinet equipment provided parts. Cool air is forced through the DV with positive air pressure, and exit the vault through a lower pressure zone; either duct work or a plenum air space in ceiling or below floor level.
The interior of the DV is accessed and egressed via a door at each end of the vault. These doors access the interconnects/power, and what is generally the rear side of the installed equipment. Cabinets are not installed through these doors, they simply are slid into place from the outside and secured to the floor. These entry door should not be overly tall, especially if the top of the door frame defines the working height of cable trays above cabinets; ladders become heavy and awkward to move about as they become taller and taller, introducing future risk to the DV.
The cooling airflow design of the network gear dictates what is "front" and "back". Most equipment flows air front to back (cold to hot .i.e., exhaust). Though some equipment can be side discharge. Some equipment may be mounted against air flow, for example network management resources, with adequate whole system cooling this will generally not impact the DV's overall performance.
While we've especially discussed the hot side of DV, it is worth noting that careful consideration should be given how cooling air will be supplied/dispersed within her cool isle side, and at what ideal temperature. Get this wrong and your DV can let out an uncomfortably cold and frigid shrill at one end of the space. An effort should be made to disperse the supply air about the space in an even manner that avoids unplanned hot/cold spots or an outright continuous windstorm. It may be necessary at some facilities to run extreme DVA (arctic) configurations, where available cooling far exceeds current cooling needs. A DVA, can be very hot or cold, it just depends where and what’s currently present. As equipment changes in time, so will heat loads.
Interconnects between cabinets can be under floor, for a very clean look, or above cabinet for ready access. Above cabinet installs should be at a comfortable working height as these pathways will be accessed thousands of times, and noting the critical nature of these systems it is best to mitigate the potential of future mishaps...
Generally, wire ways work best in single heights and straight lines, multiple height changes and course variations where convenient for the general contractor at base build will result in future install difficulties as spaces become complicated with years of installs, or may not work well from day one. Cabling pathways are inexpensive compared to many of the other construction trades, unless a projects goals are clearly articulated to the general contractor, the cabling pathways will likely be micromanaged to not impact the other installs, at the detriment overall final install.
Power can be installed via traditional conduit above or below floor, or a bus above cabinets. These systems, where code permits, should be placed out of the way and not mix with the Data/Fiber interconnects ;though power is critical to any data center, once implemented it rarely accessed. Above cabinet bus ways can introduce risk to an install, as code will dictate breaker locations; that might later be inadvertently tripped if poorly placed from an interconnect install perspective that is constantly changing. For example, in front of cable tray used to provide interconnects that are regularly accessed. On the other hand, it is obvious which breakers serve which cabinet during maintenance. Each cabinet in a data vault will likely have two disconnects, multiplied by the number of cabinet, there can be a large number of unguarded breakers present.
As a general rule in construction, especially in highly specialized spaces such as data centers, the more un-accessed a utility is in a given space, the more tucked out of the way it should be. As they say, "Fitters" are called fitters because they "make things fit" in the tightest tucked out the way spaces. This is never an inexpensive approach, but very prudent in a data center space where there is always the potential need for physical expansion of equipment space. For example, Electrical EMT and other pipework should not be permitted to block access to ceilings or raised floors unless absolutely necessary. Utilities that do not need to enter the data center space should not be permitted to do so.
A DV can be as basic as four corner cabinets, with two doors, and temporary walls and above cabinet walls to the ceiling built with steal strut to seal air gaps. As more capacity is required, additional cabinets are moved in place, segments of temporary walls removed. The cabinets will likely have an intended purposes, maybe the corner cabinets are for distribution of network resources to campus, interior cabinets for tape storage, servers, net management, clients and so on. Ideally, the campus backbone fiber would extend directly into the data vault to minimize external excursions to and from the vault.

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