0

Is it possible for a rack designed to store servers on their side (blade style) to be EIA-310-D-compliant? I suspect not, but reading the spec I couldn't find any explicit statement about it.

I know a design house who wanted to mount their Xserves from the ceiling, in a rack made by a boutique company (which has since gone out of business). I told them this would probably affect heat distribution adversely, but I wasn't able to find a definitive printed answer for them.

Edit: Background information - one of the considerations here is that if the servers aren't stored in a EIA-310-D compliant rack, it could void their hardware warranty.

username
  • 4,755
  • 19
  • 55
  • 78

2 Answers2

1

I'm not 100% sure, but I beleive the air flow through the server is somewhat designed to be mounted normally. Airflow is something often part of the design for rack-mount servers.

We have some blade based telecom equipment at work that warns very loudly about not leaving any of the covers off since it will affect airflow and cause the unit to overheat. That is how specific some equipment is about affecting the airflow.

Kevin Nisbet
  • 818
  • 6
  • 8
1

Servers generally do not depend on convection, it's almost 100% forced airflow. So if that could affect heat distribution, probably would be insignificant.

vartec
  • 6,217
  • 2
  • 33
  • 49