HP Takes On Rising Cost Of Data Center Heat

Heat in the data center is a growing problem for companies, so Hewlett-Packard today is introducing its first environmental-control equipment, a chill-water cooling system. "Moore's Law is running smack into the wall of physics," says Paul Perez, VP of storage, networking, and infrastructure for industry standard services at HP. "Data centers compared to Moore's Law have been fairly slow moving animals and haven't changed much in the last 20 years. This introduction is geared to helping customers win the war on heat and rising energy costs."

HP is offering the Modular Cooling System (MCS), which utilizes chilled water technology to triple the standard cooling capacity of a single rack, Perez says. In addition, its pitching a new rack system, the 10000 G2Sereis Rack, which the company says will provide a standardized rack for all HP server and storage platforms, and a power distribution unit management module. The MCS attaches to the side of the new 10000 G2 Series Rack, and utilizes a chilled water supply to distribute cool air across the front of a rack. HP plans to offer upgrade options to existing racks to use the MCS later this year.

The systems will allow for the deployment of up to 30 kilowatts in a single rack, about three times the amount of power than a standard rack can currently handle, Perez says. "We are branching out into rack-level and room-level solutions," he says. "For customers who are already deploying HP gear, they'll look for HP first as they are increasingly looking for ways to create a close coupling of their systems with the datacenter environment." HP ships more than 100,000 racks each year.

Today, HP offers seven incompatible racks, a problem the 10000 G2 Series rack aims to address. The power-distribution unit management module is designed to provide more reliable power by monitoring power in centralized environment. The systems will be available beginning Feb. 6. The MCS starts at $30,500, and the 42U 10000 G2 Series Rack at $1,249, and the PDU management module at $199.