Edge computing deployments are on the rise, as more and more use cases are conceived for local compute, storage, and networking. Although there are fundamental needs of all edge compute sites to ensure availability, environmental differences can be significant which impact the specific attributes of the systems you deploy. It’s important to understand characteristics like ambient temperature & humidity conditions, security / access of the space, and purpose of the space, as these parameters drive your choice of physical infrastructure. Sites with greater business risks warrant more robust infrastructure.

In this paper, we define three types of environments for micro data centers:

1. IT environments
2. commercial & office environments, and
3. industrial & harsh environments.

We discuss the challenges of each and share best practices for physical infrastructure deployments for each environment.