b Green Smart thought noise reduction for computer equipment counts as "green" because noise is a form of pollution.

Have a look at this interview about the XRackPro2 and tell me/us if you consider noise reduction to be "green" and if so, how quiet do you think a rack that reduces noise needs to be (I will pass this along to management).

http://bgreensmart.com/index.php?option ... &Itemid=81

Thanks,

Looks more like a generic questionnaire that was filled out, not a real interview.

I must say, I'm a little turned off by the whole "green" terminology. There is not one agreement on what "green" or "eco-friendly" or "organic" actually means.

So, yes, this rack could be considered "green" because it reduces noise pollution. However, it also uses more power, than a standard 4 post rack because it includes fans (yes, I realize this is a very small amount of power), so it's not so green in that regard. But you see the issue here...

If it's marketing material your after, go for it, because who's going to argue with it? I just wouldn't propagandize too much in this forum. Keep it relegated to the Vendor forum.

I have this weird concept of actually wanting to hear feedback so we can improve our products... and where best to find this feedback than a forum full of people concerned with noise.

Call me crazy, but I would guess that people on this forum have more interest in helping a company to produce better noise reduction products than most other forums on the Internet.

But if you would rather have manufacturers just produce what we want and not listen to what the public really needs, it would be much easier on all of us.

Our XRackPro2 is related but not the product for this forum, so I am not too concerned with promoting it here, I am hoping for input...so thank you for yours

stop thinking green=polarbears and smoking chimneys, start thinking green=energy reduction=cost reduction.

if you can make racks that use less energy than your competitor, that's a valid marketing argument, if you then greenwash it a bit that's fine.

ppl are getting a bit sick about climate change green, in the current financial climate it's much better to focus on energy efficiency being good economic sense. and not just for your products, you should look at your own company for this as well.

Absolutely not. The environmental message behind "green" is very widely accepted to ultimately boil down to sustainability and greenhouse gas emissions - whether it be through elimination of materials like mercury or lead from manufacturing processes, to more efficient products that consume less energy. Something that has less material impact on the environment.

Calling noise pollution reduction "green"? Total "greenwash"! Going to market with that claim would damage a brand in my opinion. How does a quieter rack help the environment? Does it keep equipment cooler, reducing electricity consumption? Unlikely. My guess is that the product in question increases cooling requirements of the components inside!

Most companies are looking for efficiencies that impact the bottom line. Being able to tout themselves as "green" is a marketing spin benefit when they move from 100+ physical servers to just 4 or 5 running virtualisation - the real win for the company is cost savings achieved through less energy requirements (lower energy consumption, and lower air conditioning requirements), less hardware maintenance (with possibly lower staff costs) and cheaper hardware support contracts.

I am glad you brought this up...because we use high volume fans (76 CFM) that use about 11 watts, we may be helping reduce energy and noise of course... because the fans are only 30 db even when moving a ton of air.

You can imagine when a server normally sits out in the open, it draws air in from its surroundings and out puts the hot air fairly close to where it intakes air from. With our XRackPro2, air is pulled in from the bottom front and hot expelled air from the equipment inside is sucked out the rear near the top. This distance between cool intake and hot exhaust is much bigger with the XRackPro2...so less chance for re-circulating hot air back into the cabinet.

Also, with 76 CFM of air per fan passing through the cabinet constantly, there may be a wind chill effect..I say "may" because we have not officially tested for it yet. Worst case, that much air flow moves the warmer air away from the equipment faster and further. Some customers do report their server, RAID, switch, etc. equipment fans spin slower because their equipment is running cooler...again, it is untested...but we know people's equipment is not overheating...hmmm

...and by the way, we do all that while filtering the incoming air...which lowers maintenance cost and down time.

So, thank you for bringing this up and we will have to investigate the power usage trade-offs between the XRackPro2 and the equipment inside.