autonomous_unit Posted July 23, 2005 Share Posted July 23, 2005 Apologies if this is a repeat topic, but the forum search engine considers "UPS" to be too short of a search term. I am only vaguely familiar with UPSs available in the US and consider "APC" to be a dependable brand. Does anyone have guidelines to choosing a UPS here that will be reliable and trouble-free? I am looking to protect a linux PC that hasn't been bought yet as well as to keep a DSL router up through the short outages we seem to see around BKK. It might be nice to be able to keep the PC running for several hours in a worst-case situation, but that is not critical as I expect to keep an old laptop around that can run on its own battery if the router stays up... So, being able to have the linux PC detect that the power is out and automatically shutdown would be very useful. I am not sure if that (driver support) varies by brand or is pretty bog-standard these days. I am also interested in UPSs that will condition the power, in case this varies by brand or model. I guess I have been lucky so far with plugging things directly into the mains power, if the crazy electric stories on this board are actually true around BKK too! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tywais Posted July 23, 2005 Share Posted July 23, 2005 APC is a good choice. That is all I buy for our research laboratory at the University and is what all my servers are plugged into. We have unstable/unreliable power here and have not had any problems with surges, brownouts, etc. with these. BTW: we have about 100 computers here, all protected. You might want to be sure to get one with either a serial or lan port to allow it to shut down your linux machine clean. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Highwayman Posted July 23, 2005 Share Posted July 23, 2005 I'd go with APC also. There are many brands available in Thailand but APC is the best known brand. If you go to www.apc.com there is a checklist to enable you to see what is best for you. As for running a PC for several hours l think you would need something very expensive to do that. I have the APC CS-500 (about 2000baht) which will run my PC for maybe 15 minutes tops. The idea is more to enable the PC to shut down without losing what you were working on or to just get over a break in power of less than a minute. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Firefoxx Posted July 23, 2005 Share Posted July 23, 2005 APC is a good brand, but it tends to be a bit expensive compared to other brands available (leonics, etc). If your server is not mission-critical, you can get by with a normal UPS. If you want the linux server to be able to shutdown by itself, you will need to get a UPS with a serial port. The linux server itself needs to have a serial port. Connect the two, and configure according to the alert standard the UPS uses. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thetyim Posted July 23, 2005 Share Posted July 23, 2005 Do not buy a G7 UPS. Have changed it twice the third one doesn't work either. My LEC UPS has given me perfect service for 5 years still on the original battery as well Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monty Posted July 23, 2005 Share Posted July 23, 2005 I am perfectly happy with Leonics. Big company with good support. I have a 3500 KVA UPS, backed up with a 400 Amps/48 Volt batterypack from them. http://www.leonics.com/html/en/pd_pqp/hbs/hbe_180.php Can power my whole house, apart from the big power users like aircons, washing machine and waterheater for up to 6 hours in case of a powercut! I'll always have Thaivisa, even with a major powercut Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johng Posted July 23, 2005 Share Posted July 23, 2005 I have a 3500 KVA UPS, backed up with a 400 Amps/48 Volt batterypack from them Errmm... how much did that little lot set you back Monty ???? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monty Posted July 23, 2005 Share Posted July 23, 2005 1500 of your very strong UK pounds But hey, compared to an emergency generator, with automatic transfer switch and the works, it's a pretty good deal. No oil changes, no chance of running out of fuel, abslolutely noiseless, etc... And as an added advantage, all the equipment behind it is perfectly safe from power spikes and the lot! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
autonomous_unit Posted July 24, 2005 Author Share Posted July 24, 2005 Thanks, all. I think a datacenter or house-wide UPS is a bit more than I am looking for. Are the APC units widely available? I did not see any in our local department store, and I did not yet realize I should be looking for one the last time I went to Pantip. What is the typical BKK selling price for one of those desktop/tower Smart UPS models, if you know? Say, for ones in the 600-1000 VA range? Do I understand correctly that the volt-amp rating is the maximum load of the device and is rougly 1.5 times the wattage of the load? Why don't they list the energy capacity, e.g. VA-H or watt-hour so you can judge how long it will run? I don't expect to put a very high load on it, but as I mentioned above I would like a reasonable run-time on battery. I want to get a low-power Athlon64 and a typical LCD display but I might put 3 or 4 hard drives in it... I did some digging around on the APC site and on google, and it seems the two ways Linux can handle these is via the serial port or via the network when the network management option card is installed. Any idea how much these cards cost, if they are available in BKK? It occurs to me it might be easier to put the DSL router on a separate UPS that will not be very close to the PC but obviously could plug into the router w/ one of these cards... I have no idea if that is cost-effective though! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tywais Posted July 24, 2005 Share Posted July 24, 2005 A long list of UPS (APC and others) with a wide range of VA ratings here: http://www.shop4thai.com/en/category/?cat=139 If you get the UPS with serial port you do not have to buy anything for your linux computer except maybet the serial cable (about 100B). Network management card you mentioned is just a standard network card in/on your PC. The UPS should come with a CD to configure the managment and the Linux kernel can be recompiled to support it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
autonomous_unit Posted July 24, 2005 Author Share Posted July 24, 2005 A long list of UPS (APC and others) with a wide range of VA ratings here:http://www.shop4thai.com/en/category/?cat=139 If you get the UPS with serial port you do not have to buy anything for your linux computer except maybet the serial cable (about 100B). Network management card you mentioned is just a standard network card in/on your PC. The UPS should come with a CD to configure the managment and the Linux kernel can be recompiled to support it. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Thanks for the URL. For the network management, I mean the APC accessory AP9617 which is an add-on board to install in the "smart slot" of the UPS to give it a web/ssh/SNMP interface over ethernet. I have used a similar interface on an APC power distribution device (not UPS) before at work, and it seems most of the newer Smart UPS models have the available slot. A quick search I did on some US websites indicates that this might indeed cost more than the UPS but it would solve one of my installation problems of not having a PC anywhere near one UPS. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tywais Posted July 24, 2005 Share Posted July 24, 2005 Thanks for the URL. For the network management, I mean the APC accessory AP9617 which is an add-on board to install in the "smart slot" of the UPS to give it a web/ssh/SNMP interface over ethernet. I have used a similar interface on an APC power distribution device (not UPS) before at work, and it seems most of the newer Smart UPS models have the available slot.A quick search I did on some US websites indicates that this might indeed cost more than the UPS but it would solve one of my installation problems of not having a PC anywhere near one UPS. It just depends on what you want to do. If you want to monitor the status and remotely control your home PC power system from work or when you are out of town, yes the web enabled UPS is the way to go. Personally I believe it may be overkill if all you want is to be sure your computer and/or the sytem isn't trashed by a hard shutdown then the rs232 method should be sufficient. Actually it wouldn't take much to write a small application to monitor the rs232 communication from the UPS and upload the status to a web site. It wouldn't give you remote control but what's happening at home. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gonzobrains Posted April 20, 2011 Share Posted April 20, 2011 RS-232? Serial? What decade are we in? Do any new motherboards even have a serial port anymore? A long list of UPS (APC and others) with a wide range of VA ratings here:http://www.shop4thai...tegory/?cat=139 If you get the UPS with serial port you do not have to buy anything for your linux computer except maybet the serial cable (about 100B). Network management card you mentioned is just a standard network card in/on your PC. The UPS should come with a CD to configure the managment and the Linux kernel can be recompiled to support it. Thanks for the URL. For the network management, I mean the APC accessory AP9617 which is an add-on board to install in the "smart slot" of the UPS to give it a web/ssh/SNMP interface over ethernet. I have used a similar interface on an APC power distribution device (not UPS) before at work, and it seems most of the newer Smart UPS models have the available slot. A quick search I did on some US websites indicates that this might indeed cost more than the UPS but it would solve one of my installation problems of not having a PC anywhere near one UPS. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tywais Posted April 20, 2011 Share Posted April 20, 2011 RS-232? Serial? What decade are we in? Do any new motherboards even have a serial port anymore? This topic was posted in "2005". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomat Posted April 20, 2011 Share Posted April 20, 2011 2005 indeed But to answer your question, then yes the motherboard manufacturers still make models in the new series with serial port, for example this one in the newest LGA1155 socket series: http://gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3778#sp Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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