How data centres fueled the rise of the access floor

Access floors have never been so popular thanks to the rise and rise of data centres. A relatively modern phenomenon, data centres are now ubiquitous. How did the trend start?

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Data centres originated in the huge computer rooms of the early ages of the computing industry. Early computer systems were complex and unwieldy, so they needed a special environment to keep working. They needed a lot of cables to connect all the parts, and a lot of power too. Old computers also had to be cooled to avoid overheating.

The boom of data centres happened during the dot com bubble of the early 21st Century. Companies started to require fast Internet connectivity and non-stop operation to establish their presence on the Internet. The typical online start-up was not in a position to installing such equipment in-house, so a number of larger companies started building very large facilities, called "Internet data centres", or IDCs, which provided businesses with a range of solutions for systems deployment and operation.

As of 2007, data centre design, construction, and operation is a well-known discipline and the place of the access floor has become widely appreciated and understood. There is a range of well-known operational metrics for data centre availability that can be used to evaluate the business impact of a disruption. Development in operation practice, and in environmentally-friendly data centre design is on-going and offers exciting potential for the access floor industry.

Fieldmans Access Floors Ltd has two decades of experience installing access floors in data centres and other environments. For more information, please call 0208 462 7100 or email Enquiries@Fieldmans.com.