power cable length for a top mounted pdu in a half rack (20-22u I believe)

[thetoad]

Any recommendations for would be an appropriate power cable length for me to buy to work with servers in a half rack so that they can be pulled out without being disconnected.

In this case, I bought a c13/19 pdu (old US apc ap7811, which the end will be cut off and replaced with a euro plug), so have to invest in a lot of new cables, so would like to get it right.

I realize that its easier when one has a full size rack with a vertical pdu as then everything is basically the same (give or take a little). I realize that the servers closer to the top need less than those at the bottom, but might just be easier to get get multiples of the same. right now my though is to just get a bunch of 3m cables (2m seems like it be too short for the ones furthest from the PDU), but perhaps I should get a mix of 2 and 3m cables?

 

[Tcalp]

Each U is 1.75" , add about 2ft for running from the PDU / to server PDU, and 36" for pull out. Roughly 6ft minimum. With maybe a couple 10ft for the longest runs.

That said, the only thing you should want to pull out without unplugging is a rack LCD KVM (IMO). You end up with a real mess of cables by wanting to have wired pull out for all your equipment. Servers once upon a time came with cable management arms as part of the rack mounting hardware but the industry has long given up on it as it's just too cumbersome to deal with.

All that said, why didn't you just get a 1/2 height 0U PDU, you can generally get them on ebay for under $100 ?