We're getting ready to move to a new colo facility and I'm designing the rack layout. While we have a full rack, we only have 12U worth of hardware right now:

• 1x 1U switch
• 7x 1U servers
• 1x 2U server
• 1x 2U disk shelf

The colo facility requires us to front-mount the switch and use a 1U brush strip, so we'll be using a total of 13U of space.

Regarding growth, I'm reasonably sure we'll be adding another 4U in servers, 1-2U of network gear, and 2-4U of storage in the mid-term. Specific questions I'm hoping to get help with:

• where should I mount the switch? the LEDs are on top...
• should I group the servers by function with space for adding new machines?
• as an alternative, should I group servers based on whether they are production or staging?
• where in the rack should I start? in the middle? at the top? at the bottom? equally spaced?

Here's a silly little ASCII diagram of what I'm thinking right now. Please feel free to tear my design apart, I've really no idea what I'm doing :) Any advice is very welcome.

edit: to be clear, the colo is providing redundant power with UPS and generator, so that's why there's no power gear in the plan, except for the 0U PDU that I didn't diagram.

    42 | -- switch ----------------------
    41 | -- brush strip -----------------
    40 | ~~ reserved for second switch ~~
    39 | ~~ reserved for firewall ~~~~~~~
    38 | 
    37 | -- admin01 ---------------------
    36 | 
    35 | -- vm01 ------------------------
    34 | -- vm02 ------------------------
    33 | ~~ reserved for vm03 ~~~~~~~~~~~
    32 | ~~ reserved for vm04 ~~~~~~~~~~~
    31 | ~~ reserved for vm05 ~~~~~~~~~~~
    30 | 
    29 | -- web01 -----------------------
    28 | -- web02 -----------------------
    27 | ~~ reserved for web03 ~~~~~~~~~~
    26 | ~~ reserved for web04 ~~~~~~~~~~
    25 | 
    24 | 
    23 | 
    22 | 
    21 | 
    20 | 
    19 | 
    18 | 
    17 | 
    16 | -- db01 ------------------------
    15 | +- disks ----------------------+
    14 | +------------------------------+
    13 | ~~ reserved for more ~~~~~~~~~~~
    12 | ~~ db01 disks ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    11 | 
    10 | +- db02 -----------------------+
     9 | +------------------------------+
     8 | ~~ reserved for db02 ~~~~~~~~~~~
     7 | ~~ disks ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
     6 | ~~ reserved for more ~~~~~~~~~~~
     5 | ~~ db02 disks ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
     4 | 
     3 | 
     2 | 
     1 |