UPS - does anybody use one

Gilly B

Gilly B

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Gillian
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I have had one for 18 months now as the area in rual mid Wales is always having power failures and spikes.

Mine is a UPS 850va and I have fried it. It is out of warranty and the battery can't be replaced. I only noticed it did not work, when I switched off the power to connect my new Western Digital my book hard drive. The unit bleeped and died.

I now have to consider buying a new one. My brother suggested I had too many things plugged into it and I could have overloaded the amps.

What make do you have?
What did you pay for it?
Where did you buy it from?
What size do you have?
What do you have plugged in to it?

For my 850va I had BT Router, Monitor, PC tower, Scanner, Printer, Laptop, 2 WD Hard Drives and a lamp. Oh dear!

Thanks guys
 
Gilly, I think the lamp may have been the killer.;) 850VA is the same as saying 850W. What you need to do is have a look on the back of the units, or the external power supplies and add up all the wattage. Then give yourself some headroom. having a 850VA unit and getting to 825 is not a good idea.

Do you need the laptop on the UPS. It's own internal battery acts as one anyway Plug this into a non UPS socket along with the lamp.:)
 
I would suggest all you need plugged in is :
BT Router, Monitor, PC tower

Plug the rest in somewhere else.
 
Chappers said:
Gilly, I think the lamp may have been the killer.;) 850VA is the same as saying 850W. What you need to do is have a look on the back of the units, or the external power supplies and add up all the wattage. Then give yourself some headroom. having a 850VA unit and getting to 825 is not a good idea.

Do you need the laptop on the UPS. It's own internal battery acts as one anyway Plug this into a non UPS socket along with the lamp.:)
Click to expand...

You have just word-for-word repeated what my brother is saying. My gripe with him is why he didn't tell me this when he suggested I get one in the first place :bang: In fact, it was him who connected it up:shrug:

john-oh said:
I would suggest all you need plugged in is :
BT Router, Monitor, PC tower

Plug the rest in somewhere else.
Click to expand...

You are correct, I know now. Although, wouldn't I need the WD Ext drive plugged in if I am using it at the time?

Thanks guys
 
Suggest you have just the Monitor, PC tower and the WD external HD connected to the UPS - that would enable you in the event of a power failure to save your data and close all applications and exit Windows intact.

Any other devices plugged into the UPS and switched on at the time of the power failure will draw on the UPS battery for their power and reduce the time you have to complete the previous paragraph.
 
hey there, i got a brand new APC 1000 smart UPS going? Its not in the box but has not been used, i have 3 but only use the 2.

PM me for me details if you want.

im in cardiff also.

http://www.apc.com/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=sua1000i


Gilly B said:
I have had one for 18 months now as the area in rual mid Wales is always having power failures and spikes.

Mine is a UPS 850va and I have fried it. It is out of warranty and the battery can't be replaced. I only noticed it did not work, when I switched off the power to connect my new Western Digital my book hard drive. The unit bleeped and died.

I now have to consider buying a new one. My brother suggested I had too many things plugged into it and I could have overloaded the amps.

What make do you have?
What did you pay for it?
Where did you buy it from?
What size do you have?
What do you have plugged in to it?

For my 850va I had BT Router, Monitor, PC tower, Scanner, Printer, Laptop, 2 WD Hard Drives and a lamp. Oh dear!

Thanks guys
Click to expand...
 
Chappers said:
Gilly, I think the lamp may have been the killer.;) 850VA is the same as saying 850W. What you need to do is have a look on the back of the units, or the external power supplies and add up all the wattage. Then give yourself some headroom. having a 850VA unit and getting to 825 is not a good idea.

Do you need the laptop on the UPS. It's own internal battery acts as one anyway Plug this into a non UPS socket along with the lamp.:)
Click to expand...

Laptop chargers really drink electricity also! i got a 250w converter in the car and it struggles to power my laptop!!
 
as has been mentioned, I would also have the ext HD's plugged into it too, I have seen a drive wiped during an unexpected powercut at college a few years ago. It was recoverable but only with specialised software so worth having those few minutes to close them down properly.
 
i have not got one at the moment but looking it to one

i work on UPS's upto 1100 KVA units lol
 
850va I had BT Router, Monitor, PC tower, Scanner, Printer, Laptop, 2 WD Hard Drives and a lamp. Oh dear!

i personally would disconnect the Router, Scanner, Printer, Laptop, 1 WD Hard Drives and a lamp. connect this to a pwer surge extension lead.

ie like a belkin

http://www.dabs.com/productview.asp...&SearchKey=All&SearchMode=All&NavigationKey=0

at the end of the day you only want to shut the PC down safely not back everything up.
 
At work I favour connecting all the ups's together and having a 4000w kettle attached.. then at least when people are moaning about their work you can still have a brew :D

Can't use UPS's in the house because the dog associates the beeping with the thunder and it terrifies her.

I've found Belkins die a death very randomly and APC's are much more long life.
 
I've got a APC Smart-UPS 1000VA, it is currently ;) driving :-

Desktop PC
Watercooling setup
22" LCD
2 x Wireless routers
2 x NAS HD drives
Broadband Modem
2 x DECT phone base stations
5.1 speaker surround sound
VOIP phone box.

:D
 
mrgubby said:
I've got a APC Smart-UPS 1000VA, it is currently ;) driving :-

Desktop PC
Watercooling setup
22" LCD
2 x Wireless routers
2 x NAS HD drives
Broadband Modem
2 x DECT phone base stations
5.1 speaker surround sound
VOIP phone box.

:D
Click to expand...

That is exactly what Justinframe (above) is selling and I have agreed to buy.
 
Another vote for APC over belkin (spit)
 
Gilly B said:
That is exactly what Justinframe (above) is selling and I have agreed to buy.
Click to expand...

It's an excellent unit, I got mine free from my brother-in-law, he has a UPS support company :thumbs:
 
The ONLY thing you need to have on UPS is the PC and external hard drives. The rest have no storage and therefore cannot lose any information.
UPS is only useful if the power goes out and you are around and can shut the PC down in the time it takes to flatten the batteries. Otherwise dont bother.

As you are concerned about spikes, and as others have said, get a surge protected Belkin or similar surge protector for the rest.
 
I bought an APC one off Ebay a few years ago. Batteries only lasted a year, but it cost me a fraction of the price. So I grabbed another couple of batteries and it's been fine ever since. Another vote for APC!

By the way 850VA = 3.7amps, but you have to remember that there are losses in power supplies used to convert mains supplies in to DC supplies for most computer-related hardware. It's probably safe to assume that the power factor will be around 0.7 so if you connect 600 watts of kit up - you'll probably be on your limit.

If it helps, I my 800VA is running 3 servers and a 24-port switch out in the garage. The whole lot pulls around 300watts (1 x Celeron 2.4, 1 x Sempron 3.0 and 1 x Pentium Dual-Core). Something of this rating should be fine for home desktop use - but don't put a laser printer on it, they pull quite a bit of power and can cause damage. The kit you had on was probably all fine - the lamp is a bit un-necessary unless it's a little energy-saver CFL.

Hope this helps and doesn't confuse!
 
i was working on my website last night when there was a power outage. needless to say i was ****ed of. could of done with a UPS. to save the work i was doing.

I thought of this thread when it happened. I dodnt post as i thought i never have power outages!
 
oldgit said:
The ONLY thing you need to have on UPS is the PC and external hard drives. The rest have no storage and therefore cannot lose any information.
UPS is only useful if the power goes out and you are around and can shut the PC down in the time it takes to flatten the batteries. Otherwise dont bother.

As you are concerned about spikes, and as others have said, get a surge protected Belkin or similar surge protector for the rest.
Click to expand...

not quite true i used to sell UPS's as part of my job and you can install software so it does a safe shutdown if its not shut down in a certain amount of time.

I beleive APS and the other big brand have this software bundled.
 
33L said:
not quite true i used to sell UPS's as part of my job and you can install software so it does a safe shutdown if its not shut down in a certain amount of time.

I beleive APS and the other big brand have this software bundled.
Click to expand...

Well I didn't know that. I will have to read up on the UPS I am buying off Justinframe to see if that does the same.
 
Auto shut down usually involves running the supplied software and connecting another lead between the UPS and the PC (usually USB these days).

If you use that, there is no need to connect the monitor to the UPS.
 
Gilly B said:
Well I didn't know that. I will have to read up on the UPS I am buying off Justinframe to see if that does the same.
Click to expand...

glad to help - i guess a ups is usless without i being able to shut down the machine safely!
 
We use a large amount of APC UPS's at work, very good kit, and easy to setup.

Connect the USB communication cable to the PC and configure the monitoring software and it can be set to shutdown the PC when the battery has dissapated. Very handy !
 
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