A DAY in the LIFE of the DATA CENTRE | RACKING SERVERS with ASH & JAMES! 

You and I both have this feeling! I presume this was just for filming purposes

@@Error-403me too

I am retired now but when I was working, we used HP ProLiant servers, and I thought that back plane looked very familiar. Yes, those 2U G5's are kind of heavy. I often worked in very crowded server racks, so this one was refreshingly empty.

Yup. I have a couple 380G5's in what I call the 'museum rack'. It has not been powered in years. Maybe I should plug in power and see if they still work.

The servers are HP ProLiant DL380 G5 (that was before HPE (5 years ago, now it is Gen10).

Fishbait075 Yup I’d like to see the same!

Network tour will be live early September!

Immediately typing network tour in the RU-vid search.

I managed to install an IBM Bladecenter H by myself. It was very difficult and probably also dangerous. Not recommended.

Try using a cage nut puller. There's a proper tool for putting in cage nuts and it's not your fingers. You can get it in a molded screwdriver handle style or a thin piece of sheet metal tool that often comes with racks. Alternatively, just use a zip tie. You can seat the first half of the cage nut with a finger and then stick a zip tie between the other side of the nut and the hole. Push it tight with one hand and pull the zip tie with the other to drag the other half of the cage nut through the hole. For extra style points use a second zip tie as a handle for the first

@@billycroan2336 Thanks. I think there’s a miscommunication. I’m aware of the tool. I have one. It resembles a nail clipper, though wide and flat. Used it often. I wasn’t referring to a stripped cage nut. I’m talking about older racks that have a pre-threaded hole in the rail itself. If the threads strip, though rare, I’ve typically had to put a nut behind the tail. I ran into this scenario once or twice when I bought a used rack on the cheap that was manufactured before the advent of cage nuts. Obviously, if a cage nut gets messed up on a rack that uses them you just pop it out and squeeze in a replacement, as I believe you were conveying. While data racks employ cage nuts now. I believe many smaller audio-oriented racks still employ pre-threaded rack rails. Cheers!

From like 2005-2010 we used zip ties .. ive been lacerated by so many zipties always wear gloves. I mean unless youre a carpenter in your spare time and have man paws of steel.

Try doing just one side first, loosely and letting the damn thing dangle diagonally for a second. Then pivot the other side up and put it screw in loosely. Then tighten both screws while supporting the back so it's flush. The process looks goofy as hell but it works.

ITServerTech I was going to say, a G5 DL380 is just a tiny bit dated in 2019...

bloody ell

its network engineering, generally good to have a cisco certificate , you'll learn about different types of optics cable ,ports ,switches and more

I worked security for a DC(datacenter) and ended up getting hired learning from escorts I did or watching videos such as these. The title for the job can go by many names as it's company based. A couple are NOC technician, data center technician. But in the details of the jobs, you're looking for things that detail the information you know. Some DCs have their tech maintain or monitor chiller information etc. And some have a different department for that as well. I don't have schooling on it but at the very least a know how for computer hardware is needed. Learn your copper terminations, learn fiber basics. If the company is looking to include splicing sometimes it is OJT otherwise it's easy to find videos on those as well the practice us harder to fullfill as equipment is expensive, but im sure there are classes for them. Rack and stack like this video etc. You may be able to get your foot in through a contractor who specializes in fiber. And doing that may even broaden your knowledge towards OSP etc. Some of those contractors are an alternate route you may take which can help you your career path. Best of luck

You mean to mess up half the data center then have to fix it all again each day? Yeah that could be interesting. Half of his video's are a lesson on what not to do tutorial.

With the increase in cost of living I have cancelled all my dps servers and moved them to home network on EOL servers, now my dev lab is my production environment, saved alot of money, now have 2 uplinks to the Internet (looking at a 3rd) and my server are highly available with several local backup sources. I have set my solar panel array and batteries to be backup power then switch to generator when the batteries run out (2 days). It's been an interesting adventure thus far only pita was finding some ip addresses to lease as I Do not need a full block.

Good luck and hope all is well.

I see lots of entry level positions in my area, granted though I’m in Silicon Valley. You could look for temp positions for rack integration for a bit until you build your resume up.

Haha. Battery array, how cute. Real data centers have a TRUE UPS room (not a standby UPS) with a generator backup. The machines just get good clean power all the time

@@rty1955 nobody cares

@@Jpsalm91 amazing how you tolerate inexperience

@@rty1955 okay

Should be fine. Some rails our clients don’t even request cage nuts unless it’s a heavier 2u

Will they continue to operate without any waiting time?

They will typically switch between main feeds in under 20 milliseconds. Just had a look online and one will switch between main feeds in less than 8 milliseconds.

2ms any good for you.... www.kvmchoice.com/detail_switch.asp?id=12858

@@catmantech thank you

Wont help if the PSU fails

Fair question, why would you still have G5 servers? It would be cheaper to buy a second hand G7 (~150 euro), depending on how often you power up the server it will make back it's money within three months for 24/7 use...

Sysadmin?

@@azvy17 I was an operator leader

i think the client specifies where they want everything putting

@@DroneCentralUK that would make sense, but still why would you want it all the way up their

@@TheSkunkyMonk probably just for future expansion and the make the rack easier to cable everything in

Steve, Yep - just the four screws in the front. Dont worry - they are plenty sturdy.

It’s really the bottom screws doing all of the work. The top ones are for redundancy…

@@chumpmu1 the top ones don't do shit. Other than only getting place if you bump into the bottom of it from behind. But that's really not much of a problem. The top ones are honestly a waste of time. When the torque finally does start to deform the ears, if anything I put screws on the top two BEFORE putting the switch in and then back threading those top screws TO PUSH the top of the ear out while I tighten the bottom ones to push the bottom of the ear in. It's the nail in the coffin of some already chinced up ears (or sometimes it's the rack itself that's bent) but it gets the job done

The servers should also have cable management arms fitted as well as the rails. I noticed some of the servers also were missing the PCI slot blanks

Out of interest, how would you do that?

@@catmantech I ordered custom fan-ducts that channel the air from the front to one side. Works perfectly.

Andy D I know right? I once dry racked 40x HP G7 DL360’s alone in less than 2 hours, and that included unboxing and preparing the waste for recycling.

Service Delivery Manager

They are, you have the left and right rail and you cannot swap those, nor can you install them upside down, the G6/G7 rails (same parts) can be installed either left or right (but again not upside down) and I think the G8/G9 (same parts) can be installed in any way as long as you have the rear of the rail facing to the back of the rack. Those G5 rails are fairly easy to install but damn near impossible to remove again, especially when there's equipment on top and below the G5 rails so you cannot get your fingers in there... G6/G7 have two tabs you push to release it, works fairly well, G8/G9 have one tab you just push and it drops the rail right out, works perfectly. Most G5's I have had to remove required a wrench to push that damn clip back in to release the rails...

The chips in there are from around 2008, so yeah they're quite old...

@@vista9434 Ahh I see. The video is dated(uploaded) 19. jul. 2019 so I thought it was recorded somewhere around that date :)

I think, they are just mounting those servers for customer. So it doesn't matter for them whether its old or new. Just follow the order.

Some smaller businesses will use older used servers and equipment to save costs. For many smaller businesses, it's the difference between having a server and not having one at all. Believe it or not, most servers are very well built and can last a very long time. In our datacenter we still have servers running all the way back from 2007 and they are still working with some of our most critical services. Maintenance costs are higher for them today compared to when we originally installed them but they are still a workhorse.

@@quilnux can totally agree. I'm using some outdated stuff from Supermicro and they do a very very great job. It surprises me a bit that they still get BIOS fixes.

I'm going to take a guess that it's working the same way as the power cables they mentioned earlier. Basically, just for redundancy since he stated "same kind of A and B principle". I wish they went into a bit more detail about them as well.

You're both correct In data centers often there are two uplinks (internet connections), depending on what you pay for. So, for critical infrastructure, it is quite common to provide two uplinks from ether different sides of the building or even from different providers (and of course still different sides of the building). Just to make sure your systems are running and online in nearly every situation. Edit: typos

usually red cables are for monitoring (alarms and logs), blue is for network connectivity (probably connecting to the tor switch)

I use simple relays for this, but be careful. Both inputs need to be the same phase of power. Devices aren't built to anticipate a sine wave doubling up all the sudden or jumping 180° without de-energizing first. Great way to blow up a capacitor. Also that shifting load is something you need to think about. It means you can never use more than about 45% of the capacity of either electrical circuit because for the other one to serve as a backup it needs to have room to double in an instant. I have seen racks go offline because one input failed and the remaining input couldn't handle the new doubled load. And to really confuse things it's not exactly doubled. With only one PSU powered the server draws x Watts. With two psus powered you don't simply divide x across both psus. Each psu regardless of the server, consumes power in the PSU alone. And that consumption doubles when you plug a second PSU in. Consumption in the main board mostly it's divided between the two but differences in airflow may cause differences in efficiency which consume different amounts of energy. The only way to really know is the test. And with the radical power savings abilities of modern chipsets another of the truth is that power usage in quadruple or more in a heartbeat if somebody starts mining Bitcoin or compressing files.

Could be one of two things. Either different traffic, like normal network and management interfaces, or for redundancy to indicate which run goes to which switch.

most technical interviews they aren't looking for the right answer, they're looking for your troubleshooting skills and that you don't panic when given new information/presented with something you've not seen before.

D'you ace it?

I'm wondering the same thing

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Especially not useful for homelabs, a G6 uses half the power and costs nearly nothing extra (so much cheaper to run) and a G7 costs ~150 euro and consumes ~40% the power that a G5 does while it is three or four times faster anyway. G5's for homelabs was fine when G6 and G7 servers were still >1000 euros each on second hand markets, since they're now cheap too there really is no reason to ever power on a G5 anymore.

It’s that much of a difference? I never did any research on g5 cause g6 and g7 are so cheap anyway

You got a lot of knowledge Thx