It is important to have a well organised data rack. This doesn’t just make your cabinet easier on the eyes, it also makes our lives as technicians a lot easier when diagnosing problems and upgrading/adding new equipment. Over time when devices are added or moved, switches and cable trays can get unorganised.
Starting fresh is a good way to make sure everything is right where it needs to be to keep the inside of the rack neat and tidy.
Recently we did a rack migration, upgrading from a small wall-mounted rack to a larger floor to ceiling unit. Depending on the current state of the rack this process can take some time. We like to make sure before we begin a migration that we are aware of what cable is going where, as during the migration the devices generally must be unplugged in order to tidy up the cable runs. This is also a good time to make sure all the devices and cables are labelled up correctly. While getting prepared we can also see if there are any outdated systems that can be phased out, replaced, or even removed straight away to keep the new setup as minimal as possible. Clear communication with the managers and staff onsite is important so we can find the best solutions.
Once the rack is tidied and labelled, we can conduct our regular work with much higher efficiency. Up to date labels makes it much easier for staff onsite to identify devices, making it easier to assist us with diagnosing issues over the phone and for staff to manually restart devices if required. Diagnosing problems faster allows us to travel to your site sooner when devices have failed. We would also have lower turnaround times replacing units as we can get easy access to the rack devices and clearly see where everything is patched into.
This reduces the stress for on-site staff and our technicians during the outage and reduces the time of the outage. This ultimately decreases any losses due to the unplanned outage.
 
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