Rich Miller: The New Data Center Geography

In this info-rich post, Rich Miller (Data Center Knowledge) talks about there wheres and whys of proliferation of data centers in certain areas. His classification of data centers into three major categories is spot on.

The first building at Facebook’s data center campus in Oregon, built on a high plain above the small town of Prineville (Population: 10,000).

The changing shape of the Internet can be seen in a three-hour drive across the mountains and plains of western Oregon. The drive winds up and around Mount Hood, and across miles of wilderness to a high plain above Prineville, a town of 10,000 residents.

It’s about 150 miles from Portland, the nearest significant city. But this is where a big chunk of the Internet resides, serving status updates and photos to many of Facebook’s 850 million users. Millions more will soon see their music and videos routed through Prineville, with the news that Apple will build a server farm in town to support its iTunes and iCloud apps.

The notion of placing major Internet infrastructure in a small town in central Oregon would have been unimaginable a few years ago. When I began covering the data center sector more than a decade ago, the most critical facilities were located in the heart of the nation’s largest cities, close to customers and fiber intersections.

More of the Data Center Knowledge article from Rich Miller

Alex Carroll

Managing Member at Lifeline Data Centers

Alex, co-owner, is responsible for all real estate, construction and mission critical facilities: hardened buildings, power systems, cooling systems, fire suppression, and environmentals. Alex also manages relationships with the telecommunications providers and has an extensive background in IT infrastructure support, database administration and software design and development. Alex architected Lifeline’s proprietary GRCA system and is hands-on every day in the data center.