We are continuing to expand our data centre in Northampton (DC4). We have nearly filled our first hall and construction is now underway on a second room which will give us the capacity for another 180-200 racks spread over 450m2 of technical space.
Right now, the raised access floor is being installed. Shortly after this we will put the electrical infrastructure, air conditioning and fire suppression. A clinical clean should see the room operational in August.
If you are familiar with DC4, you’ll already know that the data centre has already been designed to a high specification (enhanced Tier 3 infrastructure) and Hall 2 builds on this platform but adds a few new features to improve the efficiency of the data hall. I’ll talk about these in a bit more detail in a future blog post but the main highlights are:
Energy Efficiency
- Cold aisle containment system to maximise cooling efficiency
- Revolutionary “cool wall” air conditioning system (more information to follow)
- LED lighting system for power efficiency and great work area illumination
Resiliency & Protection
- High quality dust free room construction in fire resistant ISOClad
- Heavy duty, anti-static raised access floor
- VESDA early warning fire / smoke detection
- IG55 Argon / Nitrogen fire suppression system
- Dual internet feeds and numerous connectivity options available
- Dual redundant power feeds to each rack, from separate busbars, panel boards and UPS system (N+N)
- N+1 generator backup with 72hours of fuel onsite
Security
- Room size and layout changed to allow easier provision of private caged areas with minimal footprint loss
- Options for biometric or dual factor access control
- ISO9001 and ISO27001 compliant operating procedures and policies
- PCI compliant physical security measures
- 365/24/7 manned site
- Onsite NOC with remote / intelligent hands and eyes
I’ll post some more information soon about the “cool wall” system.
For more information on our data centres, download our data centres brochure.
Rik Williams
Head of DC Operations