As part of the Open Days event, we took photos of our datacenter. These are amateur photos so please excuse the quality.
Introductory word
We have prepared a virtual photo tour of our WEDOS Datacentre. We start with a tour of the building from the outside, through the corridors and offices. In the next parts we will show our own data hall and the different technologies used.
The owner of the entire building is WEDOS Internet, a.s..
A little history
Our building is a former CO (Civil Defence) shelter that is partially underground. The building was built in 1976-1977 and is made of 40-45 cm thick and honest reinforced concrete, which should probably withstand various threats from the “Cold War”.
The former shelter was used as a telephone exchange and radio broadcasting station for South Bohemia in case of war.
We bought the building in the middle of 2010 from Telefonica O2 and since it is on the backbone network of fiber optic cables, we decided to build a Datacenter. And you already know the rest of our extremely successful story… or you can find it somewhere on our website…
WEDOS Datacentre building
When you look for us, remember that you will find us in the centre of Hluboká nad Vltavou, in the courtyard of the Czech Post Office. You can reach us by the passage you see in the following picture.
View of the whole building from the back. Yes, it’s the flat-roofed building. Built-up area over 440m2, length over 35 meters. You can see the air conditioning units on the roof (there are others in the garden out of shot).
In addition to the air conditioning units, there is a motor-generator in the garden, which provides electricity in the event of a power failure. Details next time…
Let’s go back to the front. After opening the entrance gate, you will reach the courtyard where our building is located.
We don’t get visitors so we don’t play around 🙂
The yard also shows the free-cooling outlet. You can see the exhaust on the left and the intake on the right.
This is the door to our datacenter. At the door you can see RFID card readers and a security camera. Next you can see the switchboard and the thermometer and wave meter sensor, which reads the outdoor air for our free-cooling.
Before we go inside, you can see how it looked before the reconstruction:
Introduction of the building from the outside
After viewing the above article we will enter the building 🙂 .
Corridor
Entrance hall. It’s narrow, just right for moving technology. On the left you can see the door to the data hall (server room), then the door to the fire extinguishing system control room and opposite the door to the technological background, which is used for moving. On the right is the staircase to the first floor, where we have our offices. There are several information boards on the wall.
Even behind the door there is a camera and our favourite LED lights. Unfortunately, the cabling in this place is not quite optimal and the whole building is made of reinforced concrete, so all the wiring has to go on the surface.
Our ISO certificates 🙂
Close-up of the door.
We don’t open with a key, but again with RFID cards.
Yes, this is the original iron door from the original cover. We had the same one for the entrance to the server room, but due to the difficulty of handling we replaced it with a blue fire door… Behind the iron door is a small room where the center of the automatic fire extinguishing system is (for safety reasons elsewhere than the bearings of the fire). But that’s for another time…
Under the ceiling, at a safe height, there are signal lights in case of a fire alarm. Overall, it’s in the hallway twice (you’ve already seen it once in the photo above).
The way to the floor where there are offices and a spare parts warehouse. Children play… 🙂
View of the staircase and entrance door.
We took a few steps, turned around on the mezzanine, and we’d be upstairs. Opposite the staircase there is a toilet, on the right there is a door to the cloakroom and the garden (to the engine generator and air conditioners).
Upstairs we have not only a hydrant, but several fire extinguishers and an emergency kit for the engine generator (that’s the blue bin).
This corridor leads to the offices. The LED strips are lit. Savings first. On the left you enter the visitors’ room, then there is the free-cooling room, then the storage room. Opposite is the entrance to the WEDOS offices and to the right is the boiler room and sanitary facilities.
WEDOS offices
We’re moving into the offices now. So what’s waiting for us there? We’ll see about that in a moment. First we have to attach the RDIF card and that’s how we get in. The picture shows the attendance system and alarm.
This is what it looks like in our country… We have made soffits on the ceilings and we will heat with the heat from the server room. We will save about 100.000 per year on gas and at the same time we will use the waste heat from the servers. In the offices, we shine LED lights.
The photos do not show the visitors’ room and other rooms (the accountant’s office and 3 other unused offices, as well as the training room). However, you can find them elsewhere on our website.
Other photos
More photos at dc.wedos.com
Video
We have a video tour of our premises.
Video – How it looks like at WEDOS in Datacentre (short version without commentary):
Video – How it looks like in WEDOS offices(with commentary full of noise 🙂 ):
Video – How it looks like in Datacentre WEDOS (with commentary full of noise 🙂 ):
Consider these 3 videos as relaxing and not presentational.
Want to see what the building looked like inside before the conversion?
We encourage everyone to take a look at what our place looked like before the conversion to a Datacenter.
More information on our website… and for example:
Introduction of the building from the inside
More also at dc.wedos.com