Factors to Consider When Selecting a Data Center
Choosing a data center is an important decision for your business because you will be storing your critical infrastructure on someone else's premises. Several criteria must be taken into account before making your selection. These factors are a good starting point.
Location
Location is one of the most important factors involved when choosing a data center, for many reasons. The first thing to consider when it comes to placement is how easily someone from your business can get to the physical location. If you need to upgrade or maintain your equipment, this is an important consideration. Think about how expensive it is to have equipment that doesn't meet business process requirements for an extended period of time. You should also consider the area's vulnerability to natural disasters such as hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, and tornadoes.
Hopefully, the data center provider took these into account when building the facility, but it doesn't hurt to take extra care of your critical infrastructure.
Network latency
Even on high-end fiber network infrastructure, data transfer rates over the Internet slow down to about 0.82 milliseconds for every hundred miles of data that has to be transmitted. This means that the greater the geographic distance between your data center and the end users you serve, the higher your network latency, at least in general. A data center that has good infrastructure, like New York Data Center, has to think about all the components and consider the things that we mentioned above when talking about location. Simply looking at the map and finding the nearest data center where your end users are concentrated is not necessarily the best way to reduce latency.
One complicating factor to consider is that network packets don't travel the way the crow flies. Instead, they travel along wired links, which are often much longer than the absolute shortest path between the data center and the user. This means you need to consider the network infrastructure that will connect your data center to end users and the latency it causes.
Security
Your data is essential to your business. When you store it somewhere else at somewhere, like one of these STACK data centers, it is better to use a provider that uses the most advanced security measures and complies with data regulations. The facility should have a physical security barrier that includes multiple layers of security, access control procedures, monitoring, and alarm systems. Advanced monitoring should be in place to detect and notify the building or system of any possible emergency.
Power costs
Data center construction costs are measured primarily by the cost of energy required to support data center equipment and cooling. Electricity costs vary by region of the country. Data centers have high energy requirements, so operating a facility in a state with high energy costs can quickly become very expensive. Building a data center near major energy sources, such as hydroelectric dams, power plants, or wind farms, can reduce initial construction costs and reduce the risk of power transmission failures in the future. Building a data center near renewable energy sources can be a must for organizations trying to reduce their carbon footprint.
Reliability
Reliability is a key factor when choosing a data center or colocation provider. Reliability is measured by uptime in the data center world. A trusted provider should have 99.999% uptime, which means they are reliable at least 99.999% of the time. Other things to look for are employee certifications, customer feedback, and on-site technical support.
Data center colocation is an important decision that supports the future growth of your business. Businesses should carefully consider all factors to find the right data center for their needs. In fact, there are so many factors to consider and so many considerations that their priorities can vary from organization to organization. Choosing the right location for your data center starts with determining what matters most to your business and users.
