Welcome to the High Availability Hosting Blog

We’re installing new cooling ducting next week in the Sheffield Data Centre.

The new ducts will tap into our existing Evaporative Cooling system and feed directly into the computer room to a low level, providing more cleaned, cool air to the racks.  The new ducts are to suppliment the existing air intakes.

The cooling system will remain switched on throughout the installation, no servers will need to be shut down beforehand.

Engineers will be on site monitoring all systems during the install.

We’ve penciled in Monday 13th June for the work.

UPDATE:

We got this work completed Wednesday 15th June, and we’ve already had positive feedback from a customer who tells us their servers are already cooler by as much as 10 degrees!  If anyone else out there has an update to server temperature, let us know!

Evaporative Cooler
Our new cooling system went fully live this month, replacing the conventional air-conditioning units which have now been powered down (but remain as standby / backup units).  Due to the different way the cooler chills the air the process of changeover took 3 days but went without a hitch or service impact. We have now reduced our cooling energy usage by about 75%!

Evaporative Cooler System Live!

Hot aisle containment
Planned from when the Sheffield Data Centre was still on paper, we have implemented hot aisle containment on the first block of 6 racks (4×2 – comms, vmware, customer).  Hot exhaust air is now contained and evacuated from the computer room without mixing with the chilled air being pumped in.  The net result is the computer room runs cooler, the hot air pumps need less energy, and chilled air isn’t contaminated with hot air causing an imbalance.  It also looks cool!
 
Containment of the next block of racks is due to start next week.

Hot Aisle Containment

Hot Aisle Containment - entrance to hot aisle

Standby Generator
The generator has been tested, and re-wired ready for connecting to the Sheffield Data Centre.  Only problem is every time we arrange the concrete slab laying and crane to move the generator, it snows or gets too cold for the concrete to harden quick enough.  Another attempt will be scheduled for the near future, watch this space!
 
New Mailgate (spam / virus filter) going live
We have implemented a new spam / virus filter based on ESVA, having been tested by a small number of users, we hope to make it fully live before the end of Feburary – the exising Windows / SmarterMail server will then be switched off.
 
With additional ESVA servers (loadbalanced), we are planning to offer a spam / virus filtering service for users outside our own hosted email.  Email will first be sent to us for screening before being sent back to your existing mail server.  Users will get a daily quarantine email showing whats been blocked, along with options to release or block the message.
 
Hyper-V
Final designs for the Hyper-V and VMM (Virtual Machine Manager) servers are now being drafted, we hope to start testing sometime in March.  Prices have not yet been fully set, but are looking around £35 a month for an entry level Windows / Linux server.  Contact us if you’d like to trial a Hyper-V Dedicated Server.

Just before the weekend we test fired our new energy saving, environmentally friendly Evaporative Cooling system for the Sheffield Data Centre.

When running at full capacity, the system puts out 18,000 cubic metres (m3) of chilled air every hour. Filters and “ambient air” fans mix chilled air with ambient air to create a balanced ventilation system. Once commissioned next month the system will replace the existing conventional air conditioning units currently in use. The existing air conditioners will be kept for redundancy.

Powered by water, the Evaporative Cooler chills the air with water vapour, before being filtered and mixed with ambient air to dry and regulate the supply. This air is pumped into the Data Centre via new vents installed in the ceiling. Waste air is extracted by the existing pumps and re-circulated in the roof void before chilling again.

As well as saving energy (and money), the Evaporative Cooler will be more reliable and easier to service than conventional air conditioners, requiring no specialist tools, gasses or vacuum pumps.

New Evaporative Cooler undergoes first testing

Above the ceiling, in the plant room – the Evaporative Cooler pump sits on a vibration cushioning mat. Once the ducting is completed and the control gear installed the system should go live mid-December.

Hello!  Firstly, hope you like the new look blog.  We’ve moved the blog from the old home on the Sheffield Data Centre website  to a dedicated site here at www.hahosting.info – the new blog will have news, info, updates and media from HA Hosting,  TheVirtualCloud and the Sheffield Data Centre.  All the content from the original blog is here too.

This new look and feel for the blog is a sneak preview of what our websites will look like when they’re updated next week.  All  our websites will have a shared theme and flow into each other with common menus and headers.

We’ve got a lot going on right now, and we’ll be posting detailed updates later, but here’s what we’re up to in November:

HA Hosting

• Trials are being planned of Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 with failover clustering for Virtual Dedicated Servers.
• Upgrade of the Client Control Panel due before christmas.

TheVirtualCloud

• New web hosting infrastructure on Windows Server 2008 is starting to be rolled out.
• Outlook Anywhere Hosted Exchange price reduced to just £6.50 per month for a 1GB mailbox.
• First trial customers for our upcoming Hosted SharePoint service are now live.
• Replacement DNS Name Servers are now live, customer migrations due soon.

Sheffield Data Centre

• Energy Saving Evaporative Cooling technology delivered to site, awaiting installation.
• Ground works for the site generator have started.
• Low Latency Network for gamers has been successfully trailed.
• Free Bandwidth Forever is being offered in the shared colo racks.
• 5Mbit for £50 per month package coming soon.

In the short term we’re working on the new cooling system in the Data Centre, preparing the network for the Unlimited Bandwidth Forever deals, and completing the rollout of the new web hosting infrastructure.  Detailed updates for everything will be posted soon, so watch this space!