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Availability is a key design criterion for data centers. The tier levels introduced by the Uptime Institute represent industry-typical system configurations (N, N+1, N+N, etc.). The tiers convey mental images of comparative power system architecture availability and their relative reliability, maintainability, and efficiency levels for AC-powered data centers. Standards organizations, such as TIA and BICSI, have also adopted the notion of availability levels to convey basic design configuration feature sets of AC-powered data centers. With the growing interest in DC power solutions for data centers, obvious questions are being asked about similar availability level configurations for direct current power configurations. This presentation offers a qualitative overview comparison of AC and DC power reliability architectures using industry best practices performance feature design guidelines.