Please recommend me a good battery-backup (UPS) with surge protector included.

[doxavita]

"The UPS is a temporary and 'dirty' power source. Power often so 'dirty' as to be harmful to small electric motors and power strip protectors. And perfectly ideal perfect power for any electronics. Don't worry about myths that promote power conditioning or pure sine waves."

Electronics (ie disk drive), due to its own power supply, also make 'dirty' UPS power irrelevant. All electronics consider that 'dirty' power as ideal. Its 'pure but really not' output should not adversely affect any electronics. And easy to prove. Once you have the UPS charged, then pull its AC power cord from the wall. A Mac must work just fine on that only UPS power.

OK, say I were to switch to another UPS ('non pure sine wave') like this one: http://www.amazon.com/APC-BR1500G-B...4DEU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1304972915&sr=8-1 APC BR1500G or the 1000VA version. Would OS X detect the UPS via the USB cable? Is APC a better brand overall? Would automatic shut-down take place? does OS X take the precaution of closing open apps and documents? (like if the power went down at night while asleep)

 

[Clint007]

Maximum continuous power

Line voltage: 100-240V AC
Frequency: 50Hz to 60Hz, single phase
Maximum continuous power: 205W (21.5-inch models); 310W (27-inch models)

 

[mrfoof82]

Line voltage: 100-240V AC
Frequency: 50Hz to 60Hz, single phase
Maximum continuous power: 205W (21.5-inch models); 310W (27-inch models)

That's 100% CPU usage, 100% GPU usage, 100% brightness, constant audio at 100% volume while also having audio transmitted/received over line-in and outputs, disk and SSD seeking, optical drive seeking, reading from an SD card, and powering multiple peripherals (Thunderbolt, FireWire and multlplee USB devices all at peak transmission rates) while transmitting lots of data over gigabit Ethernet, 802.11n and bluetooth simultaneously.

A very extreme use case.

In reality, they use nowhere near that much power. 50% of those figures is closer to a normal, busy system. Idle systems use even less.