What is the difference between precision air conditioner and ordinary air conditioner?
It is natural to use air conditioners in computer room projects. When selecting the air conditioning equipment of the data center's refrigeration system, many IT personnel in the data center once believed that ordinary air conditioners can also be used for the cooling of the computer room, and that ordinary air conditioners have high energy efficiency, so they can reduce the energy consumption of the refrigeration system.
As is known to all, 30% of the ordinary air-conditioning cooling load is to eliminate the latent heat load, and 70% is to eliminate the sensible heat load. For precision air conditioners, the situation is quite different, mainly to eliminate the sensible heat emitted by equipment in the machine room, the heat load emitted by indoor staff and the heat and humidity load of fresh air entering the room in summer (only 5% of the total load). This determines that they are different from each other in terms of design purposes, application scenarios, and functional priorities.
Question:
1. Can small ordinary air conditioners be used for small projects?
2. What are the essential differences between ordinary air conditioners and precision air conditioners?
This article mainly explains the "difference between precision air conditioner and ordinary air conditioner" from five aspects: basic concept, product focus, control system, air filtration degree, operating performance and cost.
1、 Different basic concepts
Common air conditioners generally include household air conditioners, central air conditioners in residential areas and air conditioning systems in offices and commercial office buildings. The function of this type of air conditioner is to create a good living environment for indoor air, provide a comfortable and comfortable working and living environment for people, and make people in this space feel comfortable.
Indoor unit style of common air conditioner
Precision air conditioner is designed to meet the requirements of special process and specific environment of precision equipment. Its purpose is to accurately control its temperature, humidity, etc. and to control them within a certain range. It is also called constant temperature and humidity air conditioner, which is characterized by large air volume and variable heat load.
Installation method of precision air conditioner
2、 Product Focus
Due to different design purposes, the focus of products will be different.
Ordinary air conditioners are designed to "provide people with a comfortable and comfortable working and living environment". It is applicable to people, and the application scenarios are mainly in the semi open areas where people are active, such as living rooms, bedrooms, exhibition halls, offices, etc. Ordinary air conditioners do not have the function of "constant temperature and humidity", and the temperature difference range is 1 ℃. Therefore, ordinary air conditioners pay more attention to the design of comfort, low noise, low air supply and low wind speed.
Application scenarios of ordinary air conditioners
Precision air conditioning is designed to "provide a specific operating environment of constant temperature and humidity for precision devices such as IT equipment". This is a high-precision air conditioner for computer rooms. In order to ensure good heat dissipation of computers or server chips, the application scenarios include computer rooms, laboratories, large medical equipment rooms and other high-precision fields. Its service object is related equipment that can keep the computer room running continuously, such as IT equipment, power distribution system, power supply equipment, etc. The precision air conditioner has the function of "constant temperature and humidity", and the temperature difference range can be controlled at 0.1 ℃ or higher. Therefore, precision air conditioners pay more attention to the design of accurate control of temperature and humidity in the machine room and timely control of cleanliness.
Application scenario of precision air conditioner
3、 Different control systems
Ordinary air conditioners only have basic control systems. People can operate them through infrared remote control or download mobile phone APP intelligent remote control according to their own cold and hot needs. The degree of intelligence is relatively moderate; In addition, cooling and dehumidification can only be carried out at the same time, and local air circulation can only be carried out in the air supply direction.
The precision air conditioner has a high-precision, sensitive, microprocessor-based intelligent control system, which can quickly respond to changes in the external environment, so as to ensure that environmental changes remain within the setting range required for stable environment. For example, human-computer interaction interface, alarm protection, networking monitoring and other functions.
Control system of two air conditioners
4、 Different degrees of air filtration
Ordinary air conditioners use coarse efficiency filters, which can not remove enough dust particles. The dust will attach to the highly efficient chips to a large extent, seriously affecting the service life of related parts, and can not meet the purification requirements of computers. Most ordinary air conditioners use residential air filters, and the filtering efficiency is only 10%. This is not enough for a data center environment.
The precision air conditioner uses a high and medium efficiency filter, with an efficiency of 20%~30%, which complies with ASHRAE standards. It can filter out the dust in the air in a timely and efficient manner, effectively prevent the dust from adhering to the high-frequency chip and causing a short circuit, maintain the cleanliness of the machine room, extend the service life of related parts, and reduce the operation and maintenance costs.
Two air filtration methods for air conditioners
5、 Different operation performance and cost
The ordinary air conditioners used in most office buildings operate for an average of 8 hours a day and 5 days a week, while some commercial places, such as supermarkets and shopping malls, operate for an average of 12 hours a day and 7 days a week. Sometimes, the running time will be increased due to environmental changes or special needs. For precision air conditioners, regardless of the external environment, most data centers require 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
In addition, when the external ambient temperature drops below 32 ° F, the ordinary air conditioners with outdoor heat exchangers generally cannot operate due to low pressure. However, the precision air conditioner can operate normally at - 30 ° F, while the glycol refrigeration system can work normally at - 60 ° F.
Although the initial investment of precision air conditioners is basically much higher than that of ordinary air conditioners. However, the annual operating cost of ordinary air conditioners is $243 higher than that of precision air conditioners. This is consistent with the principle generally recognized by the industry, that is, the refrigeration capacity of ordinary air conditioner 3 cold tons is equivalent to that of precision air conditioner 2 cold tons.
Therefore, for those small projects with sufficient funds, it is recommended to consider the initial investment and operation cost; In some large-scale projects, it is still recommended to use precision air conditioners. Its year-round uninterrupted operation design, intelligent control system, constant temperature and humidity function, components and redundancy function will greatly improve the reliability of equipment operation, and will greatly reduce the operation and maintenance costs in the later period.