A data center is a facility that houses critical computing infrastructure, including hardware and software, on behalf of an organization or organizations. In the past, most data centers were physical buildings that housed server banks and other technologies to both manage the physical environment of the facility—namely, temperature fluctuations—and the flow of data in and out of the facility through connections.
In this case, hardware refers to physical computers, routers, and switches. A sever is a good example of a type of computing hardware, as is a desktop or laptop computer. Meanwhile, software refers to the applications used by businesses and powered by computing hardware. This could include web servers, applications, content management systems, and operating systems.
The purpose of a data center is to house the network of computing and file storage resources that enable organizations to work with data and run applications. In many ways, “the cloud” as most people understand it refers to operations and files that are stored and processed remotely in data centers rather than on terminals like laptops and desktops.