Network Equipment Room Aesthetics

The Aesthetics of your Network Equipment Room

Wiring an office, building or data room is an intense process that requires much planning and organization, but it’s critical for the modern business environment. Without solid infrastructure, business is slowed and productivity decreases. Still, the aesthetics of your equipment room is key to making these more efficient and effective for all that use them. Visual appeal can tell you something about the usability and thought that went into the planning and building of your cabling plan.

The first way to assure the organization and efficiency of your equipment room is to buy from the right providers. The top vendors have durable, high quality products that not only function well, but make sense to the eye. A top notch provider will share information and problem solving not only with his or her installers but with the customer. Give and take is essential to an network equipment room that works.

Make sure that all of the fasteners, grips, adhesives and walking areas are secure and high quality. While they may seem inconsequential, spending a few extra dollars on fasteners to secure the network infrastructure makes a huge difference to the organization of the room. It the copper wires fall down or are in you face, it not only makes the room dangerous, it also make it disorganized and difficult to manage.

Use an structured cabling architect, engineer or designer to make sure that the room is arranged properly. Designers know where to place the different wiring, cords, servers, plugs and other equipment all in relation to one another to maximize the efficiency- all copper or fiber optic cable is not created equal. Maximum spans and bandwidth have to be taken into account.The key principles include conservation of space and organization.

You also want the network infrastructure stored as efficiently as possible so that there is ease of movement. IT managers often have to delve in to the equipment room multiple times a day to fix problems and check the status of various machines. If it is a mess or difficult to navigate, the IT manager’s job is much more difficult. If it is easy to walk around and find the server or machine that you need, the job is much simpler.

Cable “streets, avenues and highways” make the data flow in your network equipment room understandable and easier to maintain. Cables should be wrapped tightly around cores and atria. There should also be some spare cable length to allow flex room from the closet to the outlets. Some cables will need to be densely packed into very large bundles (depending on the size of your network) which is unavoidable, but can make perfect sense to an observer who wants to trace what’s connected to what and why. The rest of the team will also appreciate it when they are not overwhelmed by cables and a poor working environment. Their IT will be more efficient and less prone to error.

Overall, making the closet and entire network infrastructure room attractive is not negligible at all. Improving the aesthetic appeal of the room increases efficiency substantially and also prevents hazards. Pick an excellent vendor and team to help you complete these tasks. A good designer and engineer can help turn a messy, unorganized and dangerous room in to a beautiful and efficient one that will be a joy to use.

NetQ Media has wide experience in equipment closets, rooms and data centers. We ‘ve been planning and designing them here in the mid-Atlantic region since 1999. The States of New Jersey and New York, plus other government, municipal and educational facilities have benefited from our leadership in achieving the highest quality cabling installation possible, as well as private enterprises. Call us to find out more.