I have a home office, and we sometimes get fuses tripping, which cuts the mains power. Doesn't happen that often, but as my PC is my business, I want to minimise any potential loss.
I was wondering about buying an uninterruptible power supply, so if the fuse goes, the PC will have power for long enough for me to get downstairs and flip the fuse back, or in case of need, power the PC down gracefully.
Spent far too long researching this, and have gone round in circles. Main problem is that I don't trust any reviews I've seen. Amazon reviews are well-known for being prompted by offers of free gift cards, and most review sites are affiliate links, so you've no idea if they praise a product because it's good, or because they get a higher commission than on others.
So, is anyone able to recommend a UPS for me? Here are some details, feel free to ask if I've missed anything...
PC is a custom build, you can see full specs here. Missing from that link is the PSU which is a Semi Modular 550w Gold PSU. I have the PC itself, four monitors and an external drive. However, the main requirement for the UPS is to provide power for the main PC and one monitor, so I can retain access if I need to power down. More power outlets is nice, but not vital.
I am a software dev by profession, no games, etc and live in the UK. Don't know if either of those points make a difference.
Thanks for any help you can give.
Just get one that can provide the wattage you need from a major name. Even the major names will probably ship the occasional DOA or dud, but if they've been around for a while or are backed by a major retailer you'll probably be more likely to get a good one that will last for years.
If you don't want to be buying a complete new UPS system every few years make sure to get one with a swappable battery.
I've had an APC BACK-UPS NS 1080 (probably no longer available) for the last 8 years or so and it's been fine. I got a weird error once and replacing the then >5 year old battery worked for that (bought it online from the company for a pretty penny and sent the old one back for recycling with their pre-labeled mailer). We have power outages every once in a while and it has been fine through them.
It has both battery backed outlets and only surge protected outlets. For best battery life during a power loss I'd only plug in one of the monitors into a battery-backed outlet (as you indicate you will do). The outlets work great with power strips too.
Edit to add that it provides sufficient power for my cable modem/router, old 17" monitor, and laptop for a couple of hours of low use. And this is a 1080VA power supply.
Key for modern electronics is you need what is called a pure sine wave UPS.
To get the extremely efficient rating on computer power supplies you need almost perfect power.
Now if you were to buy the simulated sine wave models its hard to say what happens. Some computer power supplies will just turn off if the power is not clean enough. The power supply companies say it might damage the power supply but many people do it and you do not hear reports of power supplies blowing up. Then again you are not running on the batteries very long. If you used a non sine wave generator it might cause more issues.
In any case unless your money is real tight I would look at models that say 1500va. You technically could use a smaller one because your power supply is only 500 watts. Note be careful VA numbers are not the same as watts check the watt rating if you get a smaller one.
There are many brands a lot of people buy cyberpower since it a bit cheaper than say APC.
Note plan to replace the batteries at about 3yrs. They might make 5yrs but unless you actually test by unplugging the UPS from the wall you have no idea how good your batteries are. The UPS will tell you they are fine when they are not.
I have a home office, and we sometimes get fuses tripping, which cuts the mains power. Doesn't happen that often, but as my PC is my business, I want to minimise any potential loss.
I was wondering about buying an uninterruptible power supply, so if the fuse goes, the PC will have power for long enough for me to get downstairs and flip the fuse back, or in case of need, power the PC down gracefully.
Spent far too long researching this, and have gone round in circles. Main problem is that I don't trust any reviews I've seen. Amazon reviews are well-known for being prompted by offers of free gift cards, and most review sites are affiliate links, so you've no idea if they praise a product because it's good, or because they get a higher commission than on others.
So, is anyone able to recommend a UPS for me? Here are some details, feel free to ask if I've missed anything...
PC is a custom build, you can see full specs here. Missing from that link is the PSU which is a Semi Modular 550w Gold PSU. I have the PC itself, four monitors and an external drive. However, the main requirement for the UPS is to provide power for the main PC and one monitor, so I can retain access if I need to power down. More power outlets is nice, but not vital.
I am a software dev by profession, no games, etc and live in the UK. Don't know if either of those points make a difference.
Thanks for any help you can give.
My first recommendation when discussing UPS purchase is to buy a meter to determine the ACTUAL usage of your PC. The kill-a-watt meter is an excellent method -- https://www.amazon.com/P3-P4400-Electricity-Usage-Monitor/dp/B00009MDBU
After you have ACTUAL data, then you can size your UPS. All the manufacturers provide runtime tables for each model. So if you say you want at-least 15 min protection, then you go to the APC webpage (for example) and look at the different models. You know the ACTUAL wattage used, so you can look in the runtime tables and find one that gives say 20min at that wattage. That way you a guaranteed to get the 15min you desire even after the battery degrades some over time.
Thanks for the suggestion, it's a really good idea.
However, as I mentioned, I'm in the UK, and if you look at that product on amazon.co.uk you'll see that the two 1-star reviews are because it doesn't work in the UK.
However, on that same page are suggestions for similar products. Most of these are quite a bit cheaper, which is good as I'm on a limited budget, but have enough poor reviews to make me wonder if the products are cheap because they are poor.
Any thoughts? Thanks again.
Edit: I just took a look at the almost cheapest of those alternatives and the drawbacks given in the reviews seem to be ones that won't affect what you're trying to read (well over 1 watt pull). I would say buy it: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Nevsetpo-M...show_all_btm?ie=UTF8&reviewerType=all_reviews
A crude way to estimate your computer's energy usage is to take readings from your energy meter: https://www.which.co.uk/reviews/cut...z#how-to-read-your-electricity-and-gas-meters
You'll want to unplug the three additional monitors, but otherwise leave your computer setup running as normal. Take a reading (especially including the presumably fast-moving ones in red, which should be measuring 100 watt-hour and 10 watt-hour increments) at the start of an hour, and then take a reading at the end of the hour. Turn off your computer and take new readings over the course of an hour. Subtract the energy usage when your computer equipment is off from the energy usage when your computer equipment is on.
Over the course of an hour the maximum this value should be is your power supply maximum output (550 watt-hours), less energy efficiency losses of the PSU, plus the listed energy use for your monitors, modem, speakers, etcetera. It should be much less than this.
To be as accurate as possible, everything else that uses energy in your home should be doing so as steady as possible. So if you use electricity for heating, for example, do this test when local weather stations say that the outside temperature will be pretty steady for a couple of hours. You can do this measurement two or three times over the course of a few days, alternating equipment-on first read, equipment-off second read, and equipment-off first read, equipment-on second read and then average the results. If a couple of days are going to be equivalent temperature-wise, you could do the turned on / turned off test over the course of a few hours over both days (turned on one day, turned off the second day).
It's much easier to buy a measuring device, but this would be cheaper.
Looking at the APC 850VA UPS it has a rated power output of 450 watts. Odds are, even for your setup, this would be an adequate output. But of course I can't guarantee that. And a full 450 watt pull would give only 2 minutes of runtime. (300 watt 6 minutes, 150 watts 20 minutes)
For the cheap
Kanewolf posted a comment above, "These are double conversion units that have a constant output." This refers to a design feature not previously discussed. So IF you have not encountered this before, here's what that means.
The simpler designs of UPS constantly ensure that the battery is charged, and monitor the incoming power. While doing that they simply connect that incoming power to the output so your load is running on power from the supply lines. When failure of that source is detected the monitor circuit switches to drawing power for your load from the batteries via the inverter circuits, but this change-over takes a fraction of a second. SOME devices are sensitive to that momentary sag in power supply and will reset immediately. Most Computer PSU's can keep you going through such a sag, but there is a small risk.
The higher-quality designs always feed the power from the battery via the inverters, and keep the battery charged from the supply lines. There is never a change-over sag when the supply fails. This may not be necessary for you computer, but is is for some sensitive devices.
In a way that just shows how much battery you would need if you wanted to run it for 6-8 hours on the UPS. Not really something that you really would be doing.
What would be more important would be the maximum number of watts used during the period. The UPS has to be able to deliver this maximum spike in power so you need to size it for the maximum. If not the UPS will detect you trying to draw too much power and turn off.
It depends on the device. Some show the maximum number others you can just look at it from time to time to try to get a number.
So this is a older thread and I am not sure if you put in details of the 850va unit you were looking at. Be very careful these also have a watts rating and they can vary from 400-500 watts depending the exact model. Also most these are very low end device that do not generate true sine wave output. This may or may not be a problem for your power supply.