What Does Hot Aisle/Cold Aisle Mean?
Hot aisle/cold aisle refers to a layout design especially for data warehouses where huge servers and computing equipment are kept and data is stored. The purpose of the hot aisle/cold aisle scheme is to manage air flow in data centers, consequently lowering the energy, cooling and management cost inside data centers.
Techopedia Explains Hot Aisle/Cold Aisle
The number one cost of data warehouses is the physical cooling of the building, so the hot aisle/cold aisle idea was proposed to decrease the energy and cost involved in management of servers' temperature in data centers. The most basic form of a hot aisle/cold aisle setup consists of server racks placed alternatively with cold or hot air sources placed in between. The arrangement is such that cold air intake is facing one way, while hot air exhaust is on the other side of the server rack. Other equipment is available such as blowers and chillers to increase efficiency and avoid the mixing of the different temperatures of air.