Personal computing discussed
Moderators: renee, mac_h8r1, Nemesis
esc_in_ks wrote:(Recycling UPS batteries is painful.)
esc_in_ks wrote:about an hour runtime out of it
JohnC wrote:Why? If you have such long blackouts - you should invest into a natural gas-powered standby generator
esc_in_ks wrote:I would say the expectations are pretty much unrealistic. Even "maintenance free" car batteries eventually need replacement about 3-5 years or so, depending on usage. Didn't your UPS beep you about needing battery replacement? On my more expensive SmartUPS a light will show up prompting me to replace batteries, and the manual did say starting 3 years you should watch for that. If you are the more anal type, you will probably have a spare bought before the light shows up.Fast forward 3-5 years and the power goes out while I'm home. I notice the UPS lasts about 2 minutes. Not good. The batteries in the consumer grade stuff I get perhaps just don't last as long as I wish they did. Maybe my expectations are too high.
esc_in_ks wrote:The tech guy in my previous company said that those <$100 consumer grade APCs are to be treated as glorified power bars. So I bought a SmartUPS when they went on sale. A few years back (yes, almost 3 years, so I will be on the lookout for the battery light), I bought a CyberPower unit that are their higher spec'ed line.I've generally bought a typical APC consumer grade 600 VA for $80 or so. Replacement batteries are generally expensive enough that I just buy a new unit.
esc_in_ks wrote:Don't buy <$100 units. Look for sales of higher end units at the ~$200-500 range. For batteries, the usual recommendation is upsforless.com (they have a .ca site for Canadians).Any better options than continuing forward down my horrible path? Any brand recommendations? Any good battery replacement options?
esc_in_ks wrote:Check out your community's "household hazardous waste collection day" events. They usually hold those days for people to bring weird stuff like old paints, batteries, tires (!) and they will take them for free or a low fee.(Recycling UPS batteries is painful.)
JBI wrote:In my experience, UPSes costing less than $100 do indeed tend to be junk. They work at first, but all of the ones I've owned have died after a few years (in many cases even before their first battery replacement).
JBI wrote:My community has a hazardous waste drop-off facility. I just keep a couple of boxes in the garage -- one for dead CFLs, and the other one for lead-acid/NiCd batteries (UPS, power tools, etc). Every few months I make a run down to the drop-off facility. As long as I don't show up right before closing there's no (or a minimal) line, and it only takes a few minutes.
Glorious wrote:Definitely a good idea. I've used best buy for battery-recycling in the past, but they only take rechargeables. I'm afraid that anything else, or even strange form-factor batteries like power-tools, would just go into the trash.
Flying Fox wrote:I would say the expectations are pretty much unrealistic. Even "maintenance free" car batteries eventually need replacement about 3-5 years or so, depending on usage. Didn't your UPS beep you about needing battery replacement? On my more expensive SmartUPS a light will show up prompting me to replace batteries, and the manual did say starting 3 years you should watch for that. If you are the more anal type, you will probably have a spare bought before the light shows up.
just brew it! wrote:The problem with the laser printer could be due to marginal house wiring. It sounds like the printer is drawing enough current when it starts up to case a mini-brownout; that shouldn't happen. Was the USB message triggering a system shutdown, or just popping up a warning? Plugging the printer into a separate surge strip plugged into a different outlet might help.
Glorious wrote:Definitely a good idea. I've used best buy for battery-recycling in the past, but they only take rechargeables. I'm afraid that anything else, or even strange form-factor batteries like power-tools, would just go into the trash. However, if you've got a old cell phone or laptop battery, they can be really convenient if you're going there anyway (I don't usually shop there, but they're right by where I live).
esc_in_ks wrote:I've generally bought a typical APC consumer grade 600 VA for $80 or so. Replacement batteries are generally expensive enough that I just buy a new unit.
esc_in_ks wrote:I need two units. One powers my home server (draws 50-60W at the outlet). The other powers my gaming/work PC (if it's even on, about 70W when idle, I don't remember), a gigabit switch (8W), and a small router (2W). I'd like to be able to get about an hour runtime out of it. For a 60W load, that should be around a 750 VA unit.
Any better options than continuing forward down my horrible path? Any brand recommendations? Any good battery replacement options? I'm willing to spend more if it means I can get a longer serviceable life. (Recycling UPS batteries is painful.)
Scrotos wrote:No no NO NO NO. Do NOT have another lead-acid battery sitting on-hand as a spare. They self-discharge and will crap out after 6 to 8 months.
Scrotos wrote:Why make the batteries modular if it's not economically feasible to replace them? Oh, wait, it's because APC and Tripplite and the others don't make money on selling batteries, they make them on selling UPS units. Nevermind.
Scrotos wrote:Tripplite - always runs off the batteries, no switching done when power goes out
ronch wrote:Also, does anyone here know whether or not a typical UPS will 'waste' more energy than an AVR? I'm using a coil-type AVR with this PC. I'm sure it introduces some level of inefficiency to the system, i.e., if the PC needs just 100w off the wall, putting an AVR between it and the wall will make the whole PC+AVR suck a bit more than 100w off the wall. Is this right? And will using a UPS instead of an AVR introduce more inefficiency?
just brew it! wrote:Scrotos wrote:Why make the batteries modular if it's not economically feasible to replace them? Oh, wait, it's because APC and Tripplite and the others don't make money on selling batteries, they make them on selling UPS units. Nevermind.
The solution is to use 3rd party replacement batteries. When the battery pack in my APC XS 900 needed replacing recently, I shopped around and concluded that APC was essentially charging $40 for a piece of double-sided foam tape and a 2 inch jumper wire (this particular UPS uses a pair of 12V SLAs wired in series). So I ordered a pair of compatible batteries on Amazon, re-used the existing jumper wire, and supplied my own 10 cents worth of double-sided foam tape.
JohnC wrote:6.3L V8 451hp@6,500rpm and 443 lb-ft@5,000rpm, 7-speed SPEEDSHIFT MCT, aux oil cooler, 14.2" rotors & 6-piston calipers front, 13.0" rotors & 4-piston calipers rear, 30% LF LSD, 18" AMG wheels with Continental ContiSportContact 5P
Scrotos wrote:JohnC wrote:6.3L V8 451hp@6,500rpm and 443 lb-ft@5,000rpm, 7-speed SPEEDSHIFT MCT, aux oil cooler, 14.2" rotors & 6-piston calipers front, 13.0" rotors & 4-piston calipers rear, 30% LF LSD, 18" AMG wheels with Continental ContiSportContact 5P
Is that a mercedes of some kind?
Scrotos wrote:Flying Fox wrote:I would say the expectations are pretty much unrealistic. Even "maintenance free" car batteries eventually need replacement about 3-5 years or so, depending on usage. Didn't your UPS beep you about needing battery replacement? On my more expensive SmartUPS a light will show up prompting me to replace batteries, and the manual did say starting 3 years you should watch for that. If you are the more anal type, you will probably have a spare bought before the light shows up.
No no NO NO NO. Do NOT have another lead-acid battery sitting on-hand as a spare. They self-discharge and will crap out after 6 to 8 months. If you keep a trickle charge on them, it'll keep them alive but then the life is going to be about the same as the battery in the UPS so it'll die about the same time, especially if they are from the same manufacturing run (check the burn code for clues to that).
...
Scrotos wrote:That should be in the spec (or people find out): standby, line-interactive, and online. The bigger name vendors will make more than one type.APC/Schneider Electric - switches from wall power to battery when power goes out
Tripplite - always runs off the batteries, no switching done when power goes out
Everything else - random consumer crap
esc_in_ks wrote:Here's my experience with using UPSes. I buy one, unbox it, plug it in and test it out and it provides about the amount of run-time the box says it should. Fast forward 3-5 years and the power goes out while I'm home. I notice the UPS lasts about 2 minutes. Not good. The batteries in the consumer grade stuff I get perhaps just don't last as long as I wish they did. Maybe my expectations are too high. On one of my APC 600 VA units, the color laser printer (on the non-battery side) now causes the unit to freak out and send the "power down!" message down the USB connector. That sucks when that happens---USB cable unplugged.
JohnC wrote:Scrotos wrote:JohnC wrote:6.3L V8 451hp@6,500rpm and 443 lb-ft@5,000rpm, 7-speed SPEEDSHIFT MCT, aux oil cooler, 14.2" rotors & 6-piston calipers front, 13.0" rotors & 4-piston calipers rear, 30% LF LSD, 18" AMG wheels with Continental ContiSportContact 5P
Is that a mercedes of some kind?
Nah, it's a Zaporozhets:
esc_in_ks wrote:Network UPS Tools (NUT) has worked well for me, although it can be a pain to configure.I think it dates back to the time when the low battery notifications/shutdown didn't work on Linux
esc_in_ks wrote:A 1kW heater is a pure resistive load, whilst the laser printer has all kinds of electronics in there. There's likely a huge inrush current that something like a Kill-a-Watt will just average over and not see, it could easily be a lot more than the heater draws for several milliseconds.When the color laser fires up (on the surge only side of the UPS), it doesn't draw *that* much current, on the order of a few hundred watts during warm up according to a Kill-a-watt, but still causes the UPS to fire the "oh no battery running out signal" to the PC. I've run a 1kW heater on the same circuit (not on the UPS, of course) along with everything else and not had a problem. So, I tend to think it's the UPS not dealing well with the laser's high initial power draw.
esc_in_ks wrote:I do think something's wrong with my existing APC UPS. When the color laser fires up (on the surge only side of the UPS), it doesn't draw *that* much current, on the order of a few hundred watts during warm up according to a Kill-a-watt, but still causes the UPS to fire the "oh no battery running out signal" to the PC. I've run a 1kW heater on the same circuit (not on the UPS, of course) along with everything else and not had a problem. So, I tend to think it's the UPS not dealing well with the laser's high initial power draw.