Ah! Yeah. I hear you on that. Though I have to say, my power is not much better. I live in Tornado Alley so severe storms are not uncommon. And I live in a 60 year old house in a 160 year old neighborhood. My power comes from power polls instead of more robust underground utilities. So wind (and falling trees and tree branches) are a problem too. And I have lost power due to someone hitting a pole and knocking out the transformer. Fortunately, sneezing does not knock it out which is good because I have bad hay fever!
Ha ha yes no doubt - only it won't come from my direction as Im no authority on this subject. Just posting what I've experienced. Oh and how ironic, just had a 5 hr planned outage today. Had a heap of these in the last year or so, so maybe we should add that to list as well.
Sorry, I saw that comment yesterday then my chronic *GCF I suffer from flared up and I forgot to respond. I don't know who told you that it is not good run sensitive electronics on a generator, but I'm afraid they are totally clueless. If anyone, including that person) would just takes a couple seconds (if that long!) to think about it, they would "see the light!" (Pun intended) Virtually every single mission essential facility on Earth either runs full time on, or has backup generators to keep them up and running during power outages. These include hospitals, airports and air traffic control facilities, weather stations, data centers, water and sewer treatment plants, 911/999 call centers, police and fire stations, military facilities, telecommunications, ships at sea, laboratories, food cold-storage facilities - the list goes on and on. In fact, in many communities (island communities for example), the entire power grid is powered via generators. All of those facilities have critical and very sensitive electronic monitoring and control systems that must stay running 24/7/365. The most critical systems will have a UPS (perhaps a whole facility UPS) to maintain power (and the mission) for the 30 - 60 seconds it takes for the generator to fire up, stabilize and kick in. In other facilities, when power is lost, the lights go out and there's dead silence, everyone stands around motionless, holding their breath with fingers crossed until the generator comes on line. I note the relatively low cost of such systems allow even more and more residential homes to be equipped with automatic standby generators that operate on natural or LP gas, or other fuels (gasoline or diesel). So, of course, it is fine to power even the most sensitive electronic equipment from generators. It is done, literally, all the time! *GCF - geriatric cranial flatulence
Yeah, unfortunately this is the case in far too many places. I don't understand why they don't update this in places where it is a repeat problem. A dozen years ago we had an ice storm that knocked out the power for 6 days. They had to replace a lot of lines and equipment. I expect the upfront cost of moving it underground would be more, but the ongoing maintenance saved by doing so should pay for itself many times over, I would think.
Simple. Money. Poles are typically used in old, established neighborhoods. It would take a lot of money, time and a great deal of mess and inconvenience to dig up streets and yards to convert to underground service. A lot more money than it takes to replace a downed line or blown transformer fuse every so often. So underground utilities are typically only installed in brand new developments - before streets, sidewalks, and yards are put in.
Yes, necessarily. Sorry, but you are not thinking this through. How are they going to get the power cables out of the sewer system and into your service panel in your home? Standard residential sewer pipes (that going from house to main sewers in streets) are just 4 inch pipes - when new (they get smaller over time as they get coated with grease and other "crud". There is not enough room in those pipes to run the power cables (which have to be water proof and able to take all the harsh chemicals people flush and pour down their drains). So that means the streets and each yard has to be dug up. You are talking $1000s for each home. Who's going to pay for that? Not me. And for sure, I am not paying, as a taxpayer, for all the other homes in my neighborhood either.
Mostly agreed but as they have doubled both my city utilities and property tax in the last few years while also having my entire neighborhood dug up for the past year upgrading the sewers they could have done both. The power company whined about the $200 million they spent for the previously mentioned ice storm just to get back to where they were. Money they would never have to spend again once it was done.
i see your point but i didn't mean installing them through the pipes but through the sewer tunnels / round the pipes. as in this vid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37dmhB6I3hg
Nah! Sorry but you are dreaming. You still don't understand the massive scope of such an undertaking. Yes, they could have run lines into neighborhoods through the sewer tunnels in the streets. But I ask once again, how are they going to get the power cables out of the sewer system and into your service panel in your home? Who is going to pay for that? You? Your city and fellow tax-payers? The power company? How many people want their yards dug up? Who's going to pay to restore the yard when done? Of course the power company complained about spending $200 million. Where do you think that money came from? Do you think power companies are privately own and for-profit? They aren't. The vast majority are owned by us taxpayers and are non-profit entities that are heavily regulated. They don't have $100s of millions laying around in slush funds or petty cash drawers to go back into old neighborhoods and totally upgrade everything. My phone, power and cable all come in via drops off poles. I would love to have them all underground. But I'm not paying the $1000s to have it done. If you want underground utilities, move to a newer housing development area where underground utilities already exist. Your alternative is to vote for the necessary municipal bonds that will raise your taxes even more to pay to upgrade your neighborhood. And I hear you about property taxes. Nebraska, where I live has some of the worst taxes in the country - #47, only slightly better than Connecticut, Pennsylvania and New York. And while they boast about not raising the property tax "rate" in several years, they keep raising the assessed value of my home. So no matter how you look at it, my taxes keep going up - and our streets are still full of potholes from last winter. And for the record, the majority of our property taxes don't go for utilities infrastructure. They go for schools, to pay our underpaid teachers, police, fire, roads, snow removal, and other services.
I hope it is big enough for your needs. 600VA (330W) is not very big. While technically, it should be big enough for most computers most of the time, if you have a power hungry CPU and a power hungry GPU (plus, perhaps, several sticks of RAM and several hard drives) and they just happen to maximize demands at the same point in time (not common but not rare either) you could overload the UPS. If you also have your monitor and all your network gear protected by the battery side of the UPS too, those could be the straw that breaks the back. This is NOT a worry if you are just watching YouTube, updating Facebook, or typing in forum posts. But again, if you have a power hungry computer, it is possible. I am just saying I would have suggested a bigger UPS. But not knowing your hardware, I cannot tell. My concern is you said a 550VA was "troublesome". If the same as this one, note it has the same 330W capacity specification as the BE600M1 UPS. Your 550VA UPS may have been giving you problems because it was struggling with the load. In case you are wondering why a 550VA UPS and a 600VA UPS may have the same 330 watts specification, that is due to the PF (power factor) value used in the Volt-Amperes (VA) to Watts (W) conversion calculation. The basic formula is VA x PF = W. For some reason, APC is using .55 for the PF value with the 600VA UPS (600 x .55 = 330) and they are using .6 for the 550VA UPS (550 x .6 = 330). Both are somewhat arbitrary variable values because APC has no way of knowing our specific grid voltage values or the load values that will be connected to the UPS. Typically .6 is used but I have see PF values from .5 all the way up to .8 used. In any case, there is little difference in capacities between a 550VA UPS and 600VA UPS. So again, if your 550VA UPS gave you problems due to the load you put on it, I sure hope 600VA is big enough.
Agreed. I never buy smaller than 1500VA. It's worth the extra money. Also, for anyone that hasn't thought about it, never plug a laser printer into one of these. They suck way more power than this class of device puts out.
IIRC, every UPS manual I have seen warns about laser printers. Its the toner fuser - the heating element used to "set" the toner. It draws too much. And realistically, it is rare that printer needs to be on battery backup anyway. I don't think 1500VA as the minimum is realistic for most users. 1000VA is plenty big. But one advantage to buying a bigger UPS is the bigger models tend to have the nice extra features like an LCD status display, interconnecting data cables, monitoring software, etc. Some have better performance specs too, such has faster cutover times and better regulation. Still, even a budget model is better than a surge and spike protector, IMO.
Older machine, 7x64, 3.00 GHz CPU, 8 GB RAM, one hard drive, pretty much plinking along, doing email, forums, YouTube, surfing the internet. I think I'll be okay with the 600VA. And printer never plugged into UPS.
Well, being an older machine does not really factor in - except to say that newer computer electronics tend to be more efficient. For example, 8GB of newer DDR4 RAM uses significantly less power than 8GB of older DDR3. And again, it is not uncommon that all the components inside your case will demand maximum power at the exact same moment so I also suspect you will be okay.
Agreed. My HP LaserJet = 570W, (My HP Wide Format Inkjet Printer / Plotter = only 35W) They are both plugged into 1500VA (865W) APC, but ONLY into surge protect outlets.
First, people would have to read the manual. It usually goes straight to the trash with the box. And I brought it up because I have seen it done. Twice. All of the printers we have are 1200 watts. They are just desk sized HPs. I felt it was worth mentioning for anyone that had not given it much thought. 1500VA vs 1000VA is usually a similar price. I often find the 1500 is on sale and often costs less than the 1000. For similar to less money it is an easy choice. Always price compare.
You are right to mention it, Jack. It's a useful reminder. We aren't all experts. Plus, having done something correctly one or two times previously doesn't necessarily translate into doing it correctly a third time. Years go by, memories get jumbled, mistakes happen. I always RTFM. And I'm often surprised how much contradictory info is found there! But that's another story.
No doubt if you can get a 1500VA of equal quality and similar features (and warranty) of a smaller UPS, go for the bigger UPS. That is just common sense. My point was and still is, it is not "worth the extra money" if (1) it costs extra money AND (2), if they don't need the extra capacity. I am just not going to advise someone they "need" and should get a 1500VA UPS if they don't. And FTR, I was not saying it was wrong to mention the bit about laser printers. It is indeed, a useful reminder. But so is it a good reminder to read those manuals for they too - once you get through the legal rhetoric, contain useful information and reminders too. For example, every UPS manual I have read also says not to use surge and spike protectors with UPS. That's useful. They also typically say not to use extension cords. That's not so useful. Instead, they should say if extension cords are needed, make sure they are not surge and spike protectors and that they are heavy duty and rated to easily carry the expected current.
Currently on Amazon they have a Cyberpower 1500VA for $30 less than the 1350VA (where the part number is the same except the VA value). Obviously if the 1500 was significantly more money and more power than you need it is a waste, but for less money it's the way to go, even if you don't. Always shop around. I wasn't attempting to imply you were saying it was wrong to mention the laser printers. I just wanted to make the point that few read the manuals, especially if the only copy is a PDF on their website. I'm pretty sure the last few we have bought just had a card with the website address for manuals and software downloads. Average folks see a device with plugs and think there should be nothing complicated enough about it to need to read a manual. I had a user that thought the UPS was the PC and pressed the power button on it to turn off the PC. It did indeed shut the PC down. Quickly. You make a good point on not using surge protectors with a UPS. It is indeed useful. Probably also not common knowledge as I have seen people try to do that too and I have to remove it.
My 1200VA gives me ample time to gracefully shut my PC down, and even allows me time to watch TV for a while after the power goes off. If I'm not mistaken (probably am), replacing the original 7amp batteries with 9 amp (deep cycle) batteries should give me slightly longer to watch TV anyway. The current retail price of the 1200VA UPS I bought is AU$388 on their site (I paid slightly less than that), compared to the 1600VA UPS, which on their site is AU$487. As Bill suggested, the extra cost in my case just was not worth the price.
