19-inch rack

A "19-inch rack" stands for a frame or an enclosure which is standardized for mounting multiple equipment modules. Each module has a 19 inches wide front panel; there are edges or ears that protrude each side for allowing module to be locked to the rack frame with screws.

Equipment designed to be installed in a rack is usually described as rack-mount, rack-mount instrument, a rack mounted chassis, a rack mount system, rack mountable, or just simple shelf. The electronic transceivers' height is also standardized as multiples of 1.75 inches which is equal to 44.45mm or 1 rack unit U. The height of industry standard rack cabinet is 42U.

The 19-inch standard rack is widely used, for instance, Audio, Telecommunication, Entertainment, Computing or some other industries. But the Western electric 23-inch stand and holes on 1-inch centers are also widespread in the telecommunications industry.

A 19-inch rack is usually used to house professional audio and video equipment, so does computer server equipment, saving more space under the dense hardware configurations. Here is another common use for 19-inch rack which is industrial power, control and automation hardware.

Generally speaking, a piece of equipment being installed has a front panel height 1⁄32 inch (0.031 inches / 0.787 millimeters) less than the allotted number of Us. So a 1U rack mount computer is only 1.719 inches tall instead of 1.75 inches. Also known that 2U would be 3.469 inches not 3.5 inches. This gap allows a bit of room above and below an installed piece of equipment so it may be subtracted without binding on the adjacent equipment.

April 9, 2012

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