[email protected] writes: > My minor revelation after spending a few hours in the datacenter this AM, > standing over a floor-vent while using the KVM: > > When installing a rack-mounted KVM, arrange it so that it opens onto the > hot aisle, for operator comfort. > > Personally, I'd rather have a more comfortable temperature when I'm forced to > work in the datacenter for an extended period, at the possible expense of > increased fan noise and having to walk around the racks to reach the front of > a piece of equipment.
Eh, I'm with the others here. Use remotely accessible out of band access. Me, I'm a linux guy, so I use serial consoles rather than IP accessible KVMs, and I'm spending my own money, so I use centralized serial consoles rather than serial over drac or ilo, but really the same idea applies. I want to work from my nice, quiet office or bedroom, when I actually have to think. Now, you do need to rack it and then jerk with it until the serial comes up, but most of the work is physical and that shit is heavy, so the work usually keeps me warm enough, even on the cold aisle. Policy at prgmr.com is that one guy goes to the data center (usually me) and jiggers the hardware while the other (usually nick) sits at home in a comfy chair and remotely does the actual setup. I think it works really well because the other guy verifies everything works before you leave, and even if you are fatigued from humping disk arrays up and down stairs, the other guy isn't, and he'll make sure things are set up properly before he gives the all clear. But then, most of our stuff is 3u or below, and I don't think any of our stuff has more than 8 disks, so it's all of reasonable size for one big guy to handle by himself. If we had larger stuff, we'd probably need two people in the data center. still, having one in the comfy chair at home or at the office, I think, would be a good idea. The one piece of data center comfort advice I have is "use hearing protection" - I know, it's not /that/ loud and you can take it, 'cause you are a real man (or real woman) right? but the thing I notice is that I become fatigued much more quickly without hearing protection. I want to cut things short and go home after a few hours. with hearing protection, I can pretty much hang out even in the louder of my data centers all day without problems. Me, I like the AOsafety brand 'worktunes' - 22 dbi noise reduction and a line in for my mp3 player. In the data center, they sound better than audiophile headphones due to the noise dampening, and they're cheap enough that I don't cry if they get destroyed or lost. Leave the batteries out; you don't need 'em for the headphones and the raidio will work for shit in the data center anyhow. -- Luke S. Crawford http://prgmr.com/xen/ - Hosting for the technically adept http://nostarch.com/xen.htm - We don't assume you are stupid. _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] https://lists.lopsa.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss This list provided by the League of Professional System Administrators http://lopsa.org/
