University of Montana Deploys Modular Data Center by CommScope

Afters of being in dire need of a data center upgrade, University of Montana has completed a $2.6 million modular data center, courtesy of CommScope. The prefabricated modular data center sits in a parking lot, with a slanted metal roof overhead.

CommScope launched its modular data center product, called Data Center on Demand, in March 2014. It uses evaporative cooling and includes data center infrastructure management software by iTRACS, a DCIM vendor CommScope acquired in 2013.

Tony Jablonski, associate CIO for IT central computing services at the university, said the school previously had "arguably the worst data center in public education," according to the university's IT newsletter. Some servers were moved to the new data center from a basement built in 1972, he said.

Virtualization efforts that developed over the past few years while the new data center was being planned have reduced the space required from 12 racks to about seven.

Wanting to both modernize and anticipate future scalability needs the university landed on the CommScope solution. No secondary cooling methods are employed.

The unit also doesn't have generator backup.