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• N+1 or 2N redundant designs, which result in underutilization of components
• Oversized UPSs to avoid operating near capacity limits
• Decreased efficiency of UPS equipment when run at low loads
• Under-floor blockages adding to inefficiency by forcing cooling devices to work harder

Floor Layout
As we discussed in Chapter 4, the way you lay out your datacenter has a huge impact on
the efficiency of the air conditioning system. If airflow is blocked, it is not as efficient. If
a hot-aisle/cool-aisle layout is not adhered to, you lose efficiency. When you design your
floor layout, you want to do it with hot air and cold air segregation in mind.
Also, be mindful of where cooling systems overlap in your datacenter. This is the ideal
location for equipment that runs especially hot or is especially important.

Server Configuration
It’s not enough just to get the servers up and running; be sure that you enable any
power-saving features on the servers. A lot of times IT managers don’t set power-saving
modes, rather opting for high availability. Setting power-saving modes will help save
money by reducing power consumption and cooling costs.

Floor Vent Tiles
Vented floor tiles don’t just look cool, they’re designed to facilitate airflow. In many
datacenters, however, vented tiles are either incorrectly placed or an insufficient or
excessive number of vented tiles are installed.
If you use Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD)—an analysis of airflow patterns—in
your datacenter, you can optimize datacenter cool-airflow. This allows you to fine-tune the
center’s cooling by placing vented floor tiles in their optimal locations. Some vendors will
even help you with CFD. By simply fine-tuning tile locations, some datacenters have
achieved a 25 percent reduction in cooling costs.

Rightsizing
Datacenter design and redesign involves a lot of components. For instance, a seemingly
small task such as the placement of vented floor tiles can lead to big savings. However, the
biggest thing you can do to optimize your datacenter is to design with rightsizing in mind. PART V
That simply means building for what you need.
Rightsizing has the most impact on your datacenter’s power consumption. Fixed losses
in your power and cooling systems are present whether or not you have a datacenter in
place. Organizations that have light IT loads might not even see an impact by its IT
department. However, as the IT load gets larger, organizations will see power and cooling