Raritan Dominion PX

If you need remote power control with power and environmental monitoring, the Raritan PX range of power connectors is ideal.

Guide Price: From £399
Power In: 1 or 3 phase 16A to 32A per phase.
Power Outlets: 8 to 24.
Network: 10/100 BaseT
Console: 1 local (serial)
Display: LED
Rack mount: Yes –brackets included
Power Supply: Internal
Power Consumption: <8W (no load)
Size: 440 x 167 x 44 mm
Weight: 3.6kg

The Dominion PX Series allows you to control and monitor the power connections to remote equipment with optional environmental monitoring. The unit reviewed was a PX DPCR8A-16 which has 8 power outlets and connects to a single phase mains input. This is one of a range of off-the-shelf models and you can also order custom-built models.

Devices are available in "0U" configurations that mount at the back of a rack, or 1U and 2U configurations that have the advantage of displaying the current status on a front panel display.

Models handling over 16A have circuit breakers for additional protection against overload and short circuit. This also avoids the need for changing fuses when overloads occur, and means the unit can be reset by the user rather than requiring an electrician.

Installation is trivial, simply connect the mains power and plug in the machines to be controlled. Connect to either a serial terminal or a network connection and you can manage the device using a web interface. From the web interface you can monitor the status of each outlet – state, RMS current and power. You can also see the total load as a bar chart of permitted maximum.

Any outlet can be switched on or off and power cycled with a customisable off time. You can also switch all of them on and off as a group and define custom groups that can be controlled together. Outlets can also be named, making it clear exactly what you are switching on and off! If you have multiple PX devices then outlet groups can be created across devices enabling an integrated approach to power control.

Extended monitoring is also supported and you can discover the input voltage and total load. Each outlet also reports its current draw and power factor. The front panel LEDs can be set to show the current or voltage at any outlet.

By connecting environmental sensors you can check the temperature and humidity at multiple locations in the data centre or server room. You can configure alerts for each outlet based on both upper and lower current limits, total current draw and temperatures. Alerts can be logged, emailed or set to trigger SNMP traps. You can also link alerts to actions such as powering down one or all of the outlets if any current or temperature alert is triggered. You can also set your own current threshold at which alarms will be triggered, so that local administrators can act at once to prevent potential burnouts and interruption of services.

Access to the unit can be controlled by user or group and it can use LDAP and RADIUS authentication. Connections can be encrypted and there is certificate support. For all PX models that support switching, you can define the order in which the outlets will be turned on if the PX is reset, and also the time intervals between the outlets being turned on to prevent circuit breakers being tripped. If the power is cut for some reason, when it returns power will be restored just to the outlets that were on before the outage.

For even better integrated control you can connect a PX device to any of the Raritan KVM units. The exact details of how to do this and how the combination behaves depends on the KVM device. For example, connecting a PX device to a Dominion KX II is done via the PX's serial port and a special CIM to one of the KX II's KVM ports. Once connected you can control the power to any outlet and associate power outlets with particular machines.

One step up from this is the ultimate in centralised power control when the KVMs are in turn managed via a CommandCenter Secure Gateway, which we reviewed here. In this case all of the KVMs and the power controllers can be managed as one. You can start with a few KVMs working with PX devices and simply transfer the entire hardware architecture to the CommandCenter and control it all, securely under one interface. The CommandCenter can also control ad-hoc PX units that are, say, being used to control devices other than servers connected to the KVMs.

If you need remote power control with power and environmental monitoring the Raritan PX range is ideal, with no disadvantages – you can start small and ad-hoc and build up an integrated system at your own speed.

Raritan