Law Firm - Datacenter Refresh and UPS Upgrade

Tuesday 1 May 2012

Provision of project management and engineering for a Tokyo data center, upgrading APC Symmetra to the latest Symmetra LX. Additionally, we took advantage of the opportunity to be allowed by the busy legal professionals to have a full 40-hour time window, to bolster the data center's earthquake proofing, and to remove old equipment and cable, as well as to re-vamp the structured cabling in the racks to gain more space for growth. This project long to plan, and a challenge to execute, given the many teams involved - project, construction, electricity, cabling and test. 

Team Members - PM x 2, Consultant x 2, Engineer x 10, Construction-related x 20, Key User x 2.

Users -40

Project Duration (Months) -36 person-months

Project Effort (Months)-400 person-months

Sites -Tokyo, NY

Problems -

  • End of life UPS equipment
  • Earthquake resistance could be improved
  • General datacenter "entropy" such as old cable, old equipment
  • No space in racks
  • Labeling could be improved

Solution -

  • Implement latest redundant APC Symmetra LX 8Kva with 2-hour runtime
  • Bolster earthquake proofing, which necessitates removal of all equipment and racks, and reinstallation of the entire DC. 
  • Remove old equipment and cable, and rearrange to make space
  • Label so that things are easy to find and troubleshoot

Benefits -

  • Greatly improved fireproofing and earthquake resistance in DC.
  • Space created inside and around racks, removing the need for space for additional new racks.
  • Cleanup included numbered patch cables, to allow traceabilty for better troubleshooting. 
  • Latest APC UPS technology now in place, for a supported and robust solution.

Technology -

  • APC Symmetra LX 8KVa UPS
  • APC System Racks
Japnese