Battery backup: problem with my APC?
in [Storage]
|
Prev: OK to leave approx 5% free space on 500GB NTFS partition?
Next: Clone QNX/POSIX HDD via Acronis or Norton Ghost?
From: Rod Speed on 16 Oct 2009 15:18 David Brown wrote > Rod Speed wrote >> Ian D wrote >>> Rod Speed <rod.speed.aaa(a)gmail.com> wrote >>>> Ian D wrote >>>>> kenk <kenk(a)nowhere.com> wrote >>>>>> I was sitting at my desk yesterday during a storm when there was a split-second power outage. Despite the fact >>>>>> that my battery shows all 5 lights lit, the computer died. >>>>>> Is there a better brand to use than APC? Can the battery be >>>>>> sub-par even though the test lights say it is OK? What have >>>>>> others of you chosen? >>>>> I would be looking at your PC's power supply. There is a very >>>>> brief delay between the loss of power, and the UPS switchover >>>>> to battery power. >>>> Not with continuous UPSs, there is no delay at all with those. >>>> Essentially the PC is running off the UPS output all the time and >>>> the only thing that changes with the mains failure is that the UPS >>>> isnt being charged anymore and runs off the battery instead. >>> That's correct, and those units are the ones with true sine wave output, >> Nope, the type of output is an entirely separate issue. > Both types of UPS generate roughly sine wave outputs when the inverter is active. Pity he was clearly talking about TRUE sine wave output, which only a small subset of UPSs produce. And it aint even the continuous/online UPSs that mostly do produce TRUE sine wave output. > The difference is that with a standby UPS, the inverter is not active unless the power fails, so the output is just a > filtered version of the input. Thats an entirely separate matter to TRUE sine wave output. >>> and are relatively expensive. >> Not anymore with continuous or online UPSs. > Online or continuous UPSs are more expensive than standby UPS for the same ratings. In theory that is correct. In practice there isnt a lot in it with the brand name domestic UPSs now. > Judging by a quick check on APC's website, the difference is something like 25% more expensive for "Smart UPS > online" compared to "Smart UPS" (standby). Thats not very much. > Additionally, smaller and cheaper UPSs are mostly standby types, while online ones are for more professional markets. Thats overstating it, particularly with the stuff out of china. > If you are wanting something that can give you 10 minutes at 300W, standby UPSs will be half the price. Wrong. > Online UPSs are also less efficient for smaller systems - the double conversion wastes at least 10% of your > electricity. Utterly mangled all over again. And if you do care about that, you can also get replacement power supplys that avoid the double conversion and still have the UPS functionality. > That doesn't mean that standby UPSs are a better choice for a small user - just that there are different balances to > consider and the price difference (though less than it used to be) is significant. Not anymore. >>> I was assuming that the OP was using a regular, run of the mill APC UPS. >> There's plenty of continuous/online consumer grade UPSs now. >>>>> The PC power supply should hold during >>>>> this period. Before I had a UPS, a split-second power outage >>>>> would cause clocks to lose their time, etc., sometimes, even >>>>> my monitor would blink, but the computer would hold without >>>>> a glitch. If you want to test your UPS, pull the power cord with >>>>> a load on the UPS.
From: Rod Speed on 16 Oct 2009 18:05 Ato_Zee wrote: > On 15-Oct-2009, bbbl67 <yjkhan(a)gmail.com> wrote: > >> Is not being able to hold a charge after only one year considered >> junky enough? I bought a power supply appropriate for a home >> environment, > > Most are sealed lead acid batteries, much like a vehicle > battery, and vehicle batteries generally have around a > 3 year life. Thats because of the deep cycling car batterys get, particularly in winter. You get a lot longer than that with telephone exchanges etc. > Vehicles and UPS continuously float charge, and an > UPS is generally on, which is rather longer than in > vehicle useage, other than public transport which uses > heavy duty batteries most vehicles aren't driven > continuously throughout the day. But a UPS battery gets cycled a lot less than car batterys do. > The operating conditions of UPS batteries > can rapidly deplete residual capacity. Yes, particularly with a poor charger that produces sulphation. > Main benefit of UPS is during a brown out, when > flashing BIOS, and while MS$ is updating and > the PC says installing 27 updates, don't switch off. And they do allow a graceful shutdown on mains failure too.
From: Mike Ruskai on 17 Oct 2009 00:25 On or about Thu, 15 Oct 2009 13:07:30 -0700 (PDT) did bbbl67 <yjkhan(a)gmail.com> dribble thusly: >On Oct 15, 12:41�am, Mike Ruskai ><BUTthann...(a)DONTearthlinkLIKE.netSPAM> wrote: >> You probably bought cheap, undersized units, which is why you've come to your >> erroneous conclusion. > >Is not being able to hold a charge after only one year considered >junky enough? I bought a power supply appropriate for a home >environment, if I could afford to build a computer room with an AC/UPS >with alarm monitoring system in it, I would've done so, but not within >my budget, nor most people's budgets. If it couldn't hold a charge after only one year, you spent next to nothing and got even less. Three years is a typical battery replacement interval (if you can't replace the battery, that's another sign you bought junk). You can get suitable UPS units at a typical office store with replaceable batteries, sizable to your computer's needs, for less than $200 (less than $100 if your required capacity is low enough). If you insist that your claim about UPS's being junk is not ridiculous, then provide some model numbers or brands/capacities that you've tried. Even the very inexpensive 1100VA Belkin unit I started with several years back worked better than you describe.
From: David Lesher on 18 Oct 2009 01:29 kenk <kenk(a)nowhere.com> writes: >I was sitting at my desk yesterday during a storm when there was a >split-second power outage. Despite the fact that my battery shows all 5 >lights lit, the computer died. What happens when you pull the wall plug on the UPS? Does the machine die or not? -- A host is a host from coast to coast.................wb8foz(a)nrk.com & no one will talk to a host that's close........[v].(301) 56-LINUX Unless the host (that isn't close).........................pob 1433 is busy, hung or dead....................................20915-1433
From: Yousuf Khan on 18 Oct 2009 03:35
Mike Ruskai wrote: > If you insist that your claim about UPS's being junk is not ridiculous, then > provide some model numbers or brands/capacities that you've tried. Even the > very inexpensive 1100VA Belkin unit I started with several years back worked > better than you describe. You sound like you work for a UPS company, otherwise why are you so invested in it? Just accept that people have different experiences than you, and move on. Yousuf Khan |