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UPS Recommendations?

MarkJames68 said:
As to the batteries, they will work until one day they don’t. There may be a shortening of time beforehand, but most of the higher end UPS units also do a periodic battery test itself, or you can do a manual one.
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Once or twice a year my power company tests my UPS for me. Convenient! :rolleyes:
 
kschendel said:
Most UPS's don't like to be too lightly loaded.
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This is more or less nonsense. No, its mostly nonsense. At least if you're buying quality APC units it is nonsense. Maybe CyberPower crap has a problem with light loads.

I have a 1500 VA APC unit for my 50 watt Tivo and cable box. It's fine, and will run for more than two hours without line power - so I won't miss a movie if the power drops during recording.

The only bit of truth in the "don't like to be too lightly loaded" nonsense is that the UPS has a bit of background load - my Watt's UP! meter shows that a 1500VA APC Smart (sine wave) UPS uses about 20 watts with nothing connected. Add the TiVo - and its 50 watts becomes 70 watts total draw.

There's no damage done by lightly loading a UPS. If you need 3 minutes of UPS power buy a unit close to your power draw - and lose a tiny bit of efficiency. If you want 30 minutes, buy a larger UPS with the knowledge that you'll have a few more watts of UPS load.
 
Re lightly loading a UPS: I should have been more explicit. Many if not most UPS's don't have good efficiency numbers at very light loads, so you're wasting money for an out-sized UPS. If you want long on-battery runtimes, you'll do better with a unit that can take an add-on battery, as opposed to a massively over-rated one.

I didn't mean to imply that anything would be damaged or wouldn't work.
 
kschendel said:
You might want to get a Kill-a-watt or similar power meter to see what your real load is. I'm running a fairly well loaded cMP, BenQ 32 inch monitor, 2013 rMBP, and a 2009 iMac on an APC RS 900 which is a 900 VA / 540 watt (nominal) unit, and it typically runs about 55% load. That's enough for several minutes, more if the iMac is sleeping. A 1500VA unit might be overkill unless you have some other power hogs on it. Most UPS's don't like to be too lightly loaded.

In my experience your cMP will run on the APC line-interactive stepped sine just fine, so feel free to pick APC, Cyberpower, or Tripp Lite; all three have been around for a while and make quality products.
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My APC UPS, described earlier, has a read out with various display choices. One of those choices is "Load". That is the one I display most of the time.

Lou
 
kschendel said:
Re lightly loading a UPS: I should have been more explicit. Many if not most UPS's don't have good efficiency numbers at very light loads, so you're wasting money for an out-sized UPS. If you want long on-battery runtimes, you'll do better with a unit that can take an add-on battery, as opposed to a massively over-rated one.

I didn't mean to imply that anything would be damaged or wouldn't work.
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That's good advice. One needs to balance efficiency with load.

I choose to put a 1500VA sine wave unit on my 50 watt TiVo - because I want two hours of runtime on battery. A 400VA unit might use less electricity - but it won't last a whole movie.

And typically only the higher wattage units support auxiliary batteries.
 
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If you need anymore proof about an APC Smart UPS, I present the following response from Schneider Electric., dated August 2015. Keep in mind, this model was made of metal. The only plastic were the buttons.

Thank you for contacting Schneider Electric. You have reached APC's customer care center email support. I would be happy to assist you.

According to the serial number, your model SU1000XL is 14 years old. It is really amazing to see that your UPS lasted so long. Given that these are electronic devices, life span may vary but we usually see the typical UPS last 7-9 years. I'm glad that you have upgraded your old UPS.

I see that you replaced the battery about 2.5 years ago. I appreciate if you can tell me if that is a genuine APC battery. As a matter of fact, the normal life of the RBC battery is 3-4 years. Since the battery is hot, I don't want you to take the risk of trouble shooting the UPS. We have a Trade-UPS program, you can consider this if you are interested in another UPS.

You can participate in Trade-UPS program to upgrade your old unit for a brand new unit and receive upto 25% discount. Shipping is free and you will receive free return shipping label to send the old unit back to us.

Looking forward to hear from you.

If you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact me by responding to this incident. It would be my pleasure to ensure that your issue is quickly resolved!

Solutions to most common customer problems can be found in our APC Knowledge Base which can be found at:

http://www.apc.com/support/answers.cfm

Thank you for choosing Schneider Electric!
 
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