Re: [SAGE] shipping rack servers

[Dan Rich <drich@employees.org>]

We ship servers back and forth between our Glendale and Redwood City
data centers occasionally, and have learned a few things that might help.

    * If you can, ship them already racked.  However, if you do this,
      you have to have shipping crates that are designed for it.  The
      first time we did it the folks making the decisions just wrapped
      the racks and shipped them by freight courier.  All of the racks
      "racked" themselves, and they needed a prybar to pry some of the
      machines out so they could toss the racks and buy new ones (broken
      welds and other fun damage).  On the other hand, we've been buying
      pre-racked machines directly from HP and have never had a problem
      since they come in crates with shock and tilt sensors.
    * If you de-rack them first, you can do just about anything you want
      with them.  The last batch we shipped out of the rack just got
      bubble-wrapped and cross-stacked in large boxes (10 or so machines
      to a box if I remember correctly.  With sufficient padding between
      the machines and the box sides, top, and bottom; you shouldn't
      have a problem.  We shipped a couple hundred machines that way and
      didn't lose a single one.  Again, make sure you use shock sensors
      so you can refuse the shipment if the freight company decided to
      play catch with the boxes.

One thing to check if you're going to move full racks -- we recently
found out that our data center floor isn't rated for the rolling weight
of a loaded rack (in our case just shy of 2000 pounds with 39 machines,
PDUs, network switch, and a console server).  We've done it enough times
w/o knowing any better that we have slightly creased the surface of some
of the tiles with the castors and our floor is slightly out of alignment
now.

N.J. Thomas wrote:
> We need to transfer various rack servers (mostly 1u or 2u) from one data
> center to another. This is a one time move.
>
> ...
>   
> Does anyone have any experience with something similar and have advice
> to offer?
>   

-- 
Dan Rich <drich@employees.org> |   http://www.employees.org/~drich/
                               |  "Step up to red alert!"  "Are you sure, sir?
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                               |          - Red Dwarf (BBC)