My Power!? Its uninterruptable! (and also RGB) -- ft Tripp Lite Smart 1200 PSGLCD

[@PsychoStreak]

When you've been at it so long you still have one of those old APC units, as well as the newer models. The old APC is just hosting a lamp and a battery charger, which is very handy when the other lights go out. Before that it did it's job and kept my DSL modem & router up. The grace period a UPS gives you for a controlled shutdown is truly invaluable.

[@garykelly]

I have two Tripp Lite UPSs and as much as I love Tripp Lite products, their customer service is the absolute best I have ever experienced in my entire 60 years of life.

[@СусаннаСергеевна]

The built-in UPS is one nice feature laptops always have that desktops and workstations almost never have.

[@dangerwr]

I've been running a CyberPower CP1500AVRLCD for a couple of years now and it's fantastic. I have a 5950X/3080 Ti build and I get 10 minutes of battery under load and a little over 20 minutes at idle; plenty of time to shut down properly. 👍

[@gangmeow]

I have the same ups and the same gaming rig and get about the same times you do. I love it!

[@dangerwr]

​@@gangmeow At just under $200 it's a steal compared to some other brands with the same specs. I plan on getting another one for my AV receiver and second, smaller system.

[@capsulate8642]

$250+ for a 1200VA is way beyond reasonable, but in general UPSs are very nice to have. I got a good deal on a 1500VA unit and it's gotten me through several power outages so far, and the power monitoring has been pretty handy. Super overkill though, I get like 40 minutes on battery lol

[@paulwratt]

if you can attach your own battery, then it becomes more feasible

[@343_GuiltySpark]

I bought a 1350VA APC in 2010 or so and replaced its battery last year. Was quite happy with it until just last month where it started throwing a fan fault error. I retired it to my ONT and router and picked up a brand new Cyberpower 1500VA pure sinewave unit for my desktop and am quite happy with it so far.

[@h4X0r99221]

I love the random snippets of Wendell grabbing stuff, setting up things and just random bits xD Good shit editor, keep them comming!

[@bikerchrisukk]

Completely agree!

[@Dan-Simms]

Glad you made this video, everyone with a decent gaming rig should look into getting one of these, it will save your system, or at least a few headaches of losing your games progress. My power will flicker about once a month and almost every time my roomy will get mad b/c he was in game...and my PC will still be going fine.

[@pjtruslow]

I have two UPS units, a HP T1500 G2 and a tripp lite smart900LCD which have been converted to lithium iron phosphate. the little guy has a 6AH battery, which is probably good for about 40 minutes running my server and network. the big one has a 36V 8AH pack which is probably good for around 2 hours. if my power goes out, I shutdown my desktop and server and move my networking gear to the big UPS for extended networking runtimes.

[@LA-MJ]

Where does one find replacement lithium iron phosphate batteries, and did you need to change the controller to convert it?

[@pjtruslow]

@@LA-MJ in one case I picked up a NEC alm12v7hp from batteryclearinghouse. They were manufactured by A123 systems years ago for NEC as a direct drop in for sealed lead acid sadly I didn’t buy more when they were available since they are amazing. The other is a battery module from the same seller that I modified into a standalone battery with a built in BMS which required soldering to live batteries which I would never recommend unless you understand the risks working with a battery that will happily dump hundreds of amps into any metal that comes across it. In both cases, 4 cells series of lithium iron phosphate per lead acid 12v battery is close enough that the UPS itself can be unmodified. While there are lots of sla sized lifepo4 batteries these days, none of them seem to be able to put out current like sealed lead acid batteries can, so until the new owner of a123 IP releases a successor to the alm12v7hp I don’t know what to recommend, as I can’t recommend to an average person to modify battery packs due to the risk.

[@futureb1ues]

Another great video Wendell! I'd like to share some thoughts from my own experiences. I was a big fan of Tripp Lite for many years but I eventually moved on from them because of what I consider a fatal flaw in their design. Tripp Lite UPS units conduct their power on self test through the battery without using any utility power, so if your battery went bad (or just got run down too low during a power outage), your equipment goes down hard and stays down even after the utility power returns. This is a particularly frustrating problem because sometimes the battery is salvageable but just needs to charge for a while but the tripp lite unit won't even do that because it cannot get past POST and engage the rectifier to start recharging the battery. Most other UPS vendors do not run the POST through the battery so if the battery is bad, it will alert you to change the battery while still passing power through to the equipment, essentially becoming a glorified power strip until you replace the battery, but its still better than having to rush to grab some extension cables to bypass a UPS that won't show any signs of life just because the 48VDC battery dropped to

[@n.o.b.s.8458]

Person: do I need a gaming PC? Wendell: you might, but it’s a bit more complicated than that. Ha ha ha Keep up the great work y’all. Your videos are not only informative buying advice, but also great general information that almost no one else covers. Super thorough, you guys are too knowledgeable to be bought by a company for good reviews!

[@AnimeRoot]

UPS units are super handy and I have them on pretty much all my electronics. They are worth the money, protect your stuff!

[@izzy288]

same

[@KRAVER_]

UPS is a must if you like your PC's. I use a bunch of them. one for CCTV, Gaming PC's, and Threadripper server all have their own UPS. finding replacement batteries that are actually good batteries is the tricky part.

[@DJ-Daz]

Have you tried a drop in replacement lifep04?

[@robemanchester2277]

Literally just bought the APC SMT1500C and so far so good. Love the display on it and it's understated. Double lead acid battery and it's enough for my 2 consoles, PC and TV, of which only 2 of those things will be on at any moment. Really wish it wasn't so hard to extend the plug ins though, PDUs are so stupid expensive as a consumer, so I'm stuck with 4 battery outlets, but it works in my setup.

[@ashkebora7262]

I mean... the only reason fire fighters and electricians warn you not to use power strips on power strips is purely because of two reasons: 1. Some power strips/extension cables are rated for less power than even a single normal outlet. Sometimes less than half. This plays in to point #2... 2. If you make it a habit, it becomes a lot easier to accidentally put a circuit together that's connected to itself or simply overloaded for the outlet or a particular undersized power strip/extension chord. That is to say, you should not feel bad what so ever for plugging a properly sized power strip or extension chord in to the UPS so long as you're not overloading it. Basically all of them will whine A LOT if you overload them, so it's even less of an issue for a UPS, so long as they haven't designed their plugs to be completely inadequate.

[@BigEightiesNewWave]

He is the best ever explaining online, double conversion UPS, ever and why it is tops.

[@phraun]

If you guys are ever so inclined, a homebrew lithium ion or lifepo4 ups build would be a pretty cool video.

[@davisbradford7438]

I don't have a video, but it's remarkably easy. I get 14 hours of run time if I loose power from a grid connection at 330W synthetic load.

[@ashkebora7262]

Just look up videos on backup inverters or solar setups. It's literally as easy as picking a decent model and plugging it in to the wall and a/some batteries. You'll even have quite a few options if you don't care if it has extra DC in (for EG: solar panels) or AC in (EG: for generators). It's especially easy if your task would work with only one battery cell, since you might not have to add in any extra BMS nor balance cells. (I mostly say "just look up other stuff" because these guys seem to be mostly server/pro level content. DIY with external devices does not seem to be much in their wheelhouse, as much as I'm sure they could make a good video on it)

[@davisbradford7438]

The best prebuilt lifepo4 UPS's on the market seem to be the Ecoflow River 2 and the Bluetti EB3A for ~$240. There aren't really any other companies breaking into the market.

[@kubato5054]

After just surviving the latest hurricane Ian, I can attest to the importance of battery backups. I have several servers and all my TV's and electronics on UPS. If fact, when my power goes out, I have 20 minutes to get the generator setup and running as part of my Florida power loss plan. My question is can you discuss how to test battery life leftover with a resistance check or OHM meter. I have 6 large UPS scattered around the house and knowing when to change old batteries is a pain in the rear tunnel. Also Wendell, I have been overpaying for replacement batteries too long. Most were old Chinese junk. I have over the past few years been using Battery Sharks to replace my batteries. Yes, I read all the bad reviews falsely accusing them of being bad. They only sell new high quality batteries from Vietnam and last as long as they should without the way too high prices.

[@Razear]

That's something that I've always been annoyed with - you gotta replace the battery every couple years. And it happens with every brand I've tried. Wish they could extend the longevity to something more reasonable, especially when they cost considerably more than just picking up a surge protector.

[@xDownSetx]

It's two issues that make UPSes murder batteries. They set the float voltage very high to get the absolute longest runtime out of the batteries, and when on backup power they will draw power until the battery is complete dead. Any one of those scenarios is terrible for a battery, but both is just torture.

[@gillianseed4419]

this was the case with older apc units, they kept the batteries on float 24/7 as well as incorrect float voltage newer units only charge as needed or so im told not sure about other brands

[@СусаннаСергеевна]

One solution is a supercap UPS. You won't be running a computer for more than a minute or two off of capacitors, but it is enough to sync and dismount your drives before power is lost. I don't know if there are any commercial solutions like the Tripp Lite that use supercaps, but they're not entirely unheard of in enterprise. They're a fair bit more expensive than lead-acid because those batteries are actually really cheap, but in the long run I suppose you save a little bit of money on maintenance. For a home I would just buy enterprise storage instead and just accept hard reboots whenever the power goes out though. These usually have an internal capacitor that lets them flush the write buffer before powering down, reducing the likelihood of data loss to whatever happened to be open and unsaved in software.

[@chrisw1462]

Replace it with a good LiFePO4 substitute. The UPS's charge indicator won't be accurate, but it'll last many more years than a lead acid one will.

[@xDownSetx]

@@chrisw1462 on older APCs you can make it approximate. Older units have the capability to make the UPS think it has external batteries connected. So if the APC comes stock with a 9Ah battery, and you connect a 100Ah LFP, you can make it think it has 10 external batteries. Then do a runtime calibration and it'll be pretty accurate. I believe many of the SUA and SMT models can set this, but the newer SMX APCs use electronics in the external batteries to tell the main unit they're connected so they can't be tricked.

[@Quettesh]

In EU manufacturers have to specify both parameters (VA and W) - for example I have Cyberpower 1600VA/960W UPS.

[@JeffGeerling]

0:35 - correction: nobody who hasn't had a UPS save their bacon likes UPSes ;)

[@asdf51501]

I have Cyberpower battery backup units for the inbound internet hardware and for internal network hardware, so if the power goes out we’re good for wireless devices to be connected. I might put my Mac Studio on one too, but probably not my gaming PCs. I love videos like this, that touch on aspects of our hobby that we might not normally think about. 👍🏻

[@MrHeHim]

Those cheaper ones are great if there used once or just a few short times a year, the square sign wave can/will damage and shorten the life of your hardware. You can pickup a power conditioner in between the UPS and equipment so it would feed it good clean power when on battery.

[@chromerims]

Super excellent vid 👍 Sometimes, power-related things get overlooked when putting together everything from Raspberry Pis to Threadrippers.

[@grantwiersum7394]

We're having wild wind today and the power grid has been freaking out all day. I started researching UPS's only to remember "Didn't Wendell just do a bit on a UPS?". Yup. A million questions answered.

[@FunWithKoda]

Here in the UK we have whole home surge protected fitted (sometimes) so wasn't worried about that but we have frequent Increased line voltage, normally 230v but its been hovering around 287v. Just waiting for the power company to sort it, the ups saved my PC from any harm.

[@JR-jp1rl]

@Level2Techs : Any idea what happened to Eric Raymond's project Upside after his post "UPSes suck and need to be disrupted" ?

[@Level1Techs]

Completing his vision is on my todo list. I was working with someone in Taiwan before the pandemic hit to adapt the type of batteries Eric described already in use in the Telcom industry.

[@leviathanpriim3951]

thank you. feel better about my two APC UPSs i picked up a few months ago for my PC and TV/Console/content streaming area.

[@ToloyKeripinMunsang]

Some solar generator makes a good UPS. Jackery 1000 pro I think. Double duty as emergency power source too.

[@wertacus]

After having a refrigerator and a first Gen Alexa get fried by an unscheduled power outtage, I got some ups and surge protectors and it sure is nice when the power goes out and you have time to save your game and go find out why. I get about 10 minutes on my 3090 system with the $100 cyberpower unit from costco but that's usually plenty.

[@jayhd46]

Great Video, I've been preaching UPS's for decades. At home I have one that just protects my main machine and it's twin for all the rest. Our business sells a lot of Tripplite SU1500XLCD's which are great for onprem server towers. Thanks again!

[@ThePeperich]

Remember buy at least two UPS (even common user) - PC and router to the „telephone“ socket :) so that you may be can even have internet and LAN+WLAN - if you are lucky (or use a backup LTE/5G Stick in your router with automatic fallback) you can go on; better slow than nothin and send the final mail hehe. Btw, just read a bit online due to Wendells „brown out“, „flash“ and „vacuum“ hint as I live in a house built in 1931 (Germany), those problems are not known by me (though this house was renovated in the 1990s), just to understand it. How extreme different (everything has advantages and disadvantages) the laws and industry standards/regulations are, regarding the utilities/electricity systems (net - inside house/flat cabeling - number of phases/amperes - fuses - residual current circuit breakers etc.) and duties of landlords/even owners have, between the USA and EU/Germany are is nearly weird. I didn‘t know that is so much more as „just“ 110V or 230V and the wide known aspect that the US still has so many power lines not underground. Thx for the video and keep the excellent work up! Cheers, Pepe

[@davidblakley6806]

this was one of the must haves when i built my pc i already had to replace the pervious ups and now im using a tripplite

[@pyramid011]

Our rural home has solar and a generator and I still have everything important on UPSes. In my experience, electronics last longer and provide a much more trouble free experience when powered via UPSes. Computers, network gear, everything in the rack (of course), phone systems, cameras, NVRs, TVs, sound bars, and gaming consoles. It's all on UPSes. I always go oversize, space permitting. It's not cheap, but the gear plugged into them isn't cheap either.

[@klemmonade]

That UPS sound at the beginning freaked me out. Thought my server UPS was beeping.

[@noenken]

1:36 UPS drops on table ... shakes the whole damn planet

[@damienr735]

I think Wendell is psychic. Every time I start looking into something here he comes with a video about just that a couple days later😱

[@pheelix-]

I picked up a CyberPower CP1500PFCLCD 2 years ago for $200. Batteries in it are still good and its pure sinewave. Connects to my pc via usb so I can use its software webgui to configure/test/control it. It has saved my pc's from turning off a few times due to power outages. HWinfo also detects it and allows me to use MSI Afteburner to put meters on my taskbar so I know charge state and power/watt usage. When the batteries do go out, I plan on putting in 2 Lifepo4's + BMS in it. $250 for the Tripplite SMART1200PSGLCD, is way to much for 1200VA/720W UPS.

[@patrickmtx]

That CyberPower PSU has a significant fire hazard issue with the glue that is used.

[@pheelix-]

@@patrickmtx I have the Rev 3. It doesn't have the same fire hazard issue Rev 1 & 2 does. But I will be taking it apart to remove the glue that is between the 2 capacitors. Not that it needs to be done. Just going to be on the safe side.

[@cdoublejj]

Not really a much here I didn't already know but, I really like this video because it has good info I can share with friends and colleagues

[@buf0rd]

wow. thank you. time to change it up.

[@Dr_Nick_]

If you have multiple batteries you can hook them up in parallel to reduce the strain during a power outage. This can improve the service cycle of the batteries.

[@linuxdragon57]

I have a UPS system where I replaced the batteries with high rate SLA batteries in 2019 and they're still going strong in 2024. You can use general purpose SLA, but high-rate SLA is better for this type of workload and will last longer. High-rate SLA is a bit more expensive, but it's still totally worth it. All of my UPS systems I saved from the dumpster when I worked for Batteries Plus Bulbs. People, primarily small business customers, used to bring them in for us to recycle. The thing is, we didn't have a supply chain for the whole UPS, so we'd remove the batteries and recycle those. When it fell onto me for loading up the SLA and SLI pallets, or I was the one receiving the UPS from the customer, I would remove the batteries and load the UPS into my car and use my employee discount to buy the high-rate SLA batteries at a heavily discounted price.

[@R055LE.1]

I recently replaced the batteries in my desktop ups, didn't really INTENTIONALLY drain it but it was unplugged and the batteries were completely shot. Working great now. Got it on Craigslist for like $100. I hear it kick on randomly because the electrical in my area is shit, part of the reason for using it in the first place.

[@tenoki]

I purchased two APC SMART1500 towers from my local Navy DRMO back in 2011. I have changed the batteries three times in those things. The are Line Interactive and have save me more times than I would like to admit. I need to get some additional UPSes now and These look like they would be good for the lower power devices for TVs and stuff like that.

[@mehhoona8699]

OMG, i was searching the web for reviews about ups. Which are the best one to buy etc. And now comes level1tech with a video about ups. Is it coincidence, karma who knows. I Just know that this will be very informative and making my purchase a bit less complex😁

[@610jrod]

Tripplite is solid, I have a power strip & 2 UPS from them. They're a subsidiary of Eaton

[@mattk6827]

Currently running an apc BR1500MS2, 1500va sine wave 900w and seems to be doing well for my pc. No rgb but has an lcd display, data link and while running low load watching this vid have around 65-70min runtime. The idea was to have more than 2min remaining if in game to shut down. Already lost a 4690k to a lightning strike (left a nifty streak etched across the die under the ihs), not trying to lose my 12700k or 3080. My area also suffers fairly frequent brown outs during power shifts which is worse than a full outage.

[@ghammer9773]

On rackmount versus tower. When you're talking about the 2U models, many come with feet/legs so you can perch them in as tower units without switching skus

[@lesliesavage9229]

18:00 Under what heaviest loads? 6 amps at 120 volts is 600 watts. I have a 850 watt power supply in my computer and it doesn't come anywhere near a 600 watt load, even while booting. This is measured at the wall with a watt meter. Also you do not need a pure sine wave to run most electronics. I've run a modified sine wave for years running computers off an inverter with no problems at all, including no artifacts in the screen or hum in the audio. You might not want a square wave, which is what you showed, but a modified sine wave works just fine. You're right about a lot of miss understandings in these things, and people can easily buy something that only runs for a few minutes. I've been disappointed with them, and decided to build my own for less with a lithium battery.

[@bertnijhof5413]

I live in Santiago de los Caballeros and we have 2 to 20 power-fails/week. In the past I lost one off-lease PC per year, due to motherboard or SFF power unit failures. Those power-fails also caused corrupted files. I had a UPS for the house, but the switching to batteries caused all PCs to crash. I used an UPS per PC for some time, but that only worked for max 10 minutes. The batteries of both type of UPSes always needed renewal on the wrong moment. Since 2012 I use a 1200W Avtek Surge Protector and that solved the hardware failures. I store all my data in OpenZFS and that solved the file corruption. During, the power-fail I play Solitaire on my phone and if it takes too much time I drink a beer in the local colmado on the corner, but that happens only once per month. Most of the time the power is back within a few minutes.

[@66racer]

I use a Tripp Lite power conditioner followed by a Cyberpower pure sine UPS for my desktop. Setup works great.

[@daymianhogue1634]

A more specific UPS buyers guide would be much appreciated Wendell

[@ashkebora7262]

What more specificity _is_ there? He went through all of the types and their pro/cons. The rest of it is quite literally just picking the right size, which he also went over. Unless you want him to go over specific manufacturer features and compare/contrast specific models, there's literally nothing extra to go over.

[@daymianhogue1634]

@@ashkebora7262 yes. I was thinking specific models. Because I'm not exactly sure I wanna trust just what they say on the box with certainty. Considering one mess up and the UPS is a paperweight or a bomb.

[@ashkebora7262]

@@daymianhogue1634 Any UPS that is even legal to sell in the states (or certified by the various regulatory bodies) must work within specification and must fail safely. You'd be pretty silly for not trusting the basic operations from some of the biggest manufacturers. The only thing you might accidentally do is something he very specifically mentioned in the video: Try to treat the volt-amp rating as the watt rating. They _are_ directly related, but related is not equal to.

[@daymianhogue1634]

@@ashkebora7262 uh I very much disagree with this idea like look at the exploding gigabyte power supply fiasco from earlier this year... those were even 80+ gold power supplies iirc.

[@ashkebora7262]

@@daymianhogue1634 So... because Gigabyte screwed up on a product... you assume completely unrelated companies making unrelated products would make similar mistakes? That's some serious paranoia.

[@camjohnson2004]

unless you have like a Yumcha PC power supply you will find that they will easily handle switch over style UPS. Usually on the input from the wall there is a large 350v capacitor, and if your PSU has a good rectifier circuit it will handle a spike. I am In Australia and the power spec here is 240v plus or minus 10% which is just over 260v, meaning any power supply has to handle up to that voltage and still work as intended to get certification here, You will find that even with overlap of the sine wave, its likely not even going to spike past 5% and the capacitor in your PC PSU will handle the spike by dumping the excess power into the capacitor and not into the transformer. PC Power supplies have gotten alot better than they were 10-15 years ago.

[@danney777]

Its actually funny and timely that this video comes out the day after an 8.5 hour long power outage due to 'equipment failure' rather an idiot was driving poorly in a heavy rain storm and did exactly what you showed. I was doing some docker training so i had to restart everything because i list my place.

[@brendanrandle]

you could extend the battery wires and connect it to a camping LiFePO4 battery with built in bms for longer runtime on the cheap

[@theophilusthistler5885]

LiPo is an interesting and ezpensive rabbit hole to go dowm. I was only after an 48V 800W ~50 A/h unit.

[@darkavenger10k]

From memory (I'm sure someone will correct me if wrong) VA (Volt-Amp) is the power consumed without taking in power factor nor efficiency losses. W (Watts) is the actually power being used in the real world. This can be another issue with buying UPS's as if you have any equipment with bad power factor correction this can throw out expected run times by quite a bit. Personally I have an older APC 1500VA 2U rack mount which I got from a hospital as being critical equipment they replace them regardless of if they are still working or not so I got a good 2 years out of it before having to change the batteries making it a very cost effective way for a home server.

[@awocrf]

VA * pf = W

[@criostasis]

My biggest issue with UPS's is the price and I think thats why most people dont buy one. Also the huge price jump to get the same model but rack mount!!! I have a Cyber Power 1500VA and the rackmount version is over double the price!

[@ThunderKat]

I love my UPS, I don't care about the battery more than I care about voltage control, enough capacitors to keep a stable voltage before reaching my PSU, having battery charge is just an extra... I got a APC-UPS, very respectable brand but I only could afford a cheap one with 600VA, enough to keep a gaming computer running while on idle state (watching movies, browsing..) More than 2 years serving me well, is a secure feature more than anything against a dog stepping on a cable and Brownout voltage on the main line or overvoltage. Best of all is that your router keep working for at least one hour if you power off the PC fast during a blackout and use internet to make phone-calls (emergency) or use/charge the smartphone until light come back while keeping your internet at home becomes a quality of life. It can last for days if you mod a router and avoid using the transformer by redirect battery DC current directly into the router, there are videos about it but is something you do when you live in a dark land where power goes off for days during a storm or things like that. getting a high efficient transformer to get the 12V DC for the router is another simpler solution. If I had to buy a good one for my PC I would go with 1200VA just to compensate for any lost in power when batteries degrade over the years, it could last 3-10 years depending on the type of battery use on them. We need to wait for Tesla to develop their battery/capacitor tech and implement all that into new UPS and see how they handle in the near future. They will get cheaper and better for sure :) Note that if the device force you to change the battery after only 2-3 years of use, that's just a "scam" to force you to buy one. In theory it should keep working at least a surge protection if nothing else and should only power-off everything if the battery can't handle the power of your rig but even a half-dead battery should provide 50% of it's charge same as a Tesla Car, is all the same but the car is way more complex.

[@Kerosyn]

would appreciate a closer look at how important a pure sine wave output really is, because I have yet to find two people anywhere on the internet who both agree on how necessary they think it is _and_ provide reasoning based on consistent evidence rather than theories. most UPSs on the market in a reasonable price range use simulated sine

[@sarrasmith2508]

I have an old 600ish VA UPS dedicated to my ethernet equipment, notably my Cable modem, router, and network switch. When the town I live near caught on fire, and the power went out, our VOIP phone line kept working, so we got instructions from the county sheriff instructing us to not evacuate and shelter in place. Would have had nothing otherwise, the cell network collapsed completely and there was no other readily available communication lines here. It took several days to get cell comms up, they had to truck in mobile towers from out of state.

[@cybersecuritydeclassified4793]

Wendell is awesome!

[@charlesballiet7074]

2-3 years. my apc ups still going strong 5 years. though I do plan to replace the battery portion this year

[@JoriDiculous]

UPS is a must have. I have two, where one works . .lol .. Anyway, the APC i bought (my 2nd ups) is great. One BIG drawback is the contacts on the back. Only the stupid computer plugs , no normal plugs. And that is basically the story of all (consumer) UPS you can buy here. And since only Computers come with that type of plug you're (almost) screwed hooking up routers, switches etc to tye UPS. You can get extensions to plug in normal powercable to the ups. But it's is extra money, and a mess of cables.

[@eberger02]

You can buy the connector. Forgotten the name. Much much cheaper than buying the full extension. Then you just wire it in yourself replacing a plug.

[@bradhumphrey5223]

I do not like Tripp Lite UPS's. The ones I have seen, if you take it apart, they put the battery right up against the wall with the charger/inverter. The charger/inverter is what generates the most heat inside the unit. Heat on batteries = short life for SLA batteries. And that is what I have experienced with Tripp Lite, batteries that only last 2-3 years (This might also have to do with poor battery management by the unit). Most other UPS companies, you can get 3-5 years or more before you need to replace the battery. Also, do not let your batteries go completely bad before replacing them. Dead/shorted batteries can and will damage the charge circuits in the UPS. So just replacing the batteries at that point, will not bring it back to life. Have seen that many times with customers (especially with APC brand).

[@QuickQuips]

Ups is necessary with sensitive stuff like speakers and NAS. My Smartups 1500 has saved me a lot of headaches and concerns over a few blackouts.

[@KuramaKitsune1]

I stuck a growatt infinity 1500 in front of my pure sine wave ups, Seems to work well enough in testing

[@AncienRegimeStudios]

Does anybody know what model those two monitors are and what stands they're mounted on?? I love that setup. As for UPS I'm thinking of spending $3500-$5000 for a propane powered electric generator and wall panel next to my circuit box for that..

[@NatureQuest2024]

Any idea when the next UPS video will drop? Very interesting topic. Thank you for simplifying it

[@metaleggman18]

Oh yeah, the xbox 360 and one power bricks will stay lit (console off, brick unplugged) for a like several minutes, sometimes even like 10 or 20. I always noticed that when unplugged the console for moving stuff around

[@ronnyspanneveld8110]

So what you are saying is "if you live in the US with a power gird from 1850 you need an UPS" ?

[@stephen1r2]

Or a 100 amp house that just, very recently, entered the 3 wire age. My house (rental) has all bedroom/living room outlets (and lamps) on one of two 15 amp breakers. Summer is an adventure

[@eberger02]

I was actually already looking at getting a UPS. One thing I had hoped would be covered is how quickly they need to switch between mains power and battery power with a standard good computer power supply. My understanding was that they (decent quality computer PSU should last for 1 AC cycle assuming 60hz, or 16.667ms without power, but then you get loads with 5ms etc. Is this overkill or are computer PSU not so great… Also, shipping batteries is a pain. I think I will get one with an external connection and then plug in some Lithium Phosphate (not “Lithium Ion”) batteries. They last a lot longer than lead-acid. Much higher up front cost but cheaper in the long run, although my experience with looking for internal lead acid ones is that the dimensions mean they are used in burglar alarms etc. and so, atleast in U.K., they take the piss with price. Cheapest up front would probably be to get a UPS with an external connector and then use some common lead-acid car batteries. They are cheap as chips.

[@xDownSetx]

Take a look at used enterprise grade APC UPSes. They are cycled out of service at a high rate and you can find completely perfect units, sans battery, for a great price. I bought a used APC SMT2200-RM2U and connected 5.2kWh worth of LiFePO4 batteries to it for some ludicrous runtime. The great thing about the enterprise APCs is even if they only have an internal battery, they can run more of less indefinitely on battery. The gotcha is you need an older unit that you can connect to with an FTDI USB to Serial dongle to lower the float voltage to match what's safe for LiFePO4 batteries or they will literally cook. With the proper float voltage they should last ~7-10 years easily. The rackmount units, even though they have an internal battery, have a very easily accessible battery connector that sticks out the front with decent slack. They aren't very loud either.

[@eberger02]

@@xDownSetx thanks. Are APC a good make? I have a domestic one from them and looked at their software and dismissed them. I don’t even have the software anymore. Doesn’t matter much if the hardware is good though.

[@xDownSetx]

They are very reliable devices. The enterprise stuff is used to keep server and networking equipment online, so their transfer time is fast enough for most any use case. There's not much to the official software aside from calibrating runtime, and telling your computer to automatically power down. It's mostly a "set it and forget it" device. There is opensource software called apcupsd that will let you monitor the UPS in more detail.

[@WilReid]

Alternatively, live near a hospital. Even though they have their own power backups, cities make them a priority for electrical service in all sorts of ways. If/when the power does go out b/c of a line being down, they and anyone else on that distribution trunk get emergency priority repairs. And the utility companies keep a better watch on their lines year round so they don't have an emergency situation. I bought an APC UPS over 15 years ago, got my 2-3 years out of it, and I'm not sure it ever once got used. My power simply doesn't go out here. If it did, I'd be looking at a whole house solution and likely some off-grid green generation along with a diesel generator. As is though, my city has to be hit with multiple inches of ice before power is affected, and by then I'm not worried about the PC.

[@mattatwar]

We moved to N1C LIPO4 UPSs at work expected to last at least 10 years.

[@ChazLakinger]

Nobody likes UPS's? I LOVE UPS's! I may not like replacing the batteries but in my opinion they're absolutely essential for any computer that isn't a laptop and it blows my mind that some people choose to not have one. My server rack has redundant APC UPS's each with an expansion battery and I get well over an hour of runtime from it. Though that's mostly irrelevant now that I bought an inverter and some LiFePo4 batteries to act as a gigantic UPS that will last 6-8 hours in the event of a power outage. Ok maybe I've taken it a bit far but like I said I like UPS's!

[@Apex180]

Failure mode of a APC SMART 750 - caught on fire, lucky i was in the home office when it did this and got it disconnected and removed from the house before it caused any further damage.

[@reallunacy]

Right now I only use a UPS on my network. I've got a few rack mount units I'm about to replace the batteries on then I'll be upgrading by UPS situation.

[@cell21633]

I ran the full gauntlet from standby, to line interactive, to double conversion ups's every time the battery wore out and had a reason to upgrade. I'll say this from what I'm reading from the comments: Don't use a solar generator as your main ups. They'll work in a pinch, but I haven't seen one with user replaceable batteries (are you joking?) and there's no monitoring interface to tell your load when it's switched to backup power. I've moved away from CyberPower because the CP1500PFCLCD units have a defect. Look up conductive yellow glue of death here on youtube to see their failure mode. I've had 2 units die on me in this manner, and I have another 2 in service that are awaiting their fate. One of the units is serving as a testbed for LiFe batteries. With the latest failure, splurged on a refurbished double conversion ups. Been happy so far, and having the load on an isolated circuit is a nice piece of mind. Serves the internet and wifi to two houses.

[@guy_autordie]

In france, I had many times every every small flickering, not the ones you see in movies. And when I see many times, it was per day. LED lights kinda change that. I really believe in building/house UPS. All none sudden big power like a vacuum cleaner, kitchen thingies should be on that raffined "100%" stable lines. But the rest, yes it should be. I still have 2 powerstrips form APC, they are great. I had one power cut (neighborhood) when my computer stays up a good 2 or 3 seconds. Amazing stuff. Also, we have only one grounding rode here. (anodized copper, 1m deep)

[@pixel_assembly]

Why does modern power supply not handle modified sine wave good? Shouldn't they iron out that and pass DC to the components

[@eDoc2020]

It's due to active power factor correction circuitry and I don't know how much of a problem it actually is. When I got my first APFC PSU I tested it under load with a modified "sine" wave UPS (the 500VA version of the one Wendell showed) and it was fine.

[@rwinkdopey]

If you are going to pay for a SmartPro Net UPS you really should look at the SU2200XLA, it is an Online UPS with 1600W for basically the same price.

[@LoneWolf-wp9dn]

A lot of places have just really poor electrical grid with a lot of fluctuations... its really worth it to have a ups to save yourself from spot drops... but then again it pays to have some kind of regulator for your whole house because some of your shittier electronics will die from fluctuations much faster than IT stuff... tvs are a prime candidate

[@matthewmenteer5673]

I think the dwell time on the power supply is incredibly important for users with UPS. If your at the upper limits of your power supply ie. 600w in a 800w power supply fluctuations on the input side are going to be more dramatic in the output. The internals like capacitors and coils are sized accordingly, larger capacitors are able to cope with transient voltages much easier than smaller cheaper ones found in lesser wattage and lower quality power supplies. I question the information on the square ac wave vs the pure sine wave. Most now are using modified square waves when not pure sign, is it really damage inducing to power supplies found on typical consumer electronics? I really think this goes back to the limits of the power supply and how close we are to those limits. UPS are also better if they are bigger, the amount of currant per ah coming from the sla batteries really dictates how long they last. That and its two fold if you have larger capacities it can greatly increase your run time, doubling the Ah can easily more than double your run time because of the lesser stress put on those batteries. the voltage sags much less if you have more and more robust cells to distribute the load with. Overprovisioning helps everything but the wallet.

[@Trylen]

So far I have a APC Back-UPS NS 1080 that a got from a yard sale for $15 about 5 years ago, only had my first battery swap in it a month ago. It only runs my Cable modem, PFSense Box, main Juniper POE+ switch and that's it. Nice to know if the power goes out, the main network stays up about 24 minutes. Still gotta get something for the NAS though.

[@robertkohler4173]

Do you know it stays up about 24 minutes because you tested that, under load? or are you going by sales specs?... From experience they are not the same

[@Steve25g]

I run differente up's in the 3000va class, 2 and 3U. had some battery package, which was placed by a German service operator. the ups are operated in South America. The trick of deepcycle lead is, keep those batteries cool, all time. for some batteries, this is spec'ed at20°c, other 25°c. 5° make a ton of life lost. for longuevity, you should only use 30% of capacity., which means, talking about our ups's, you need to add a ton of batteries. There are people offgrid for 27 years, with flooded lead deep cycle, in temp stabilised rooms.

[@markbooth3066]

Don't forget to get an external bypass switch too. This allows you to bypass the UPS output when you need to change the batteries in the UPS. Switch to bypass, turn off your UPS, change the batteries, power up the UPS, switch back to the UPS, and hope you don't get power cut while your UPS is being bypassed. With UPS batteries lasting just 2-3 years (depending on lots of factors like whether you adequately cool your UPS) a bypass is a requirement to keep having the longest uptime amongst your techie friends. *8') Incidentally, if a UPS is powering down attached equipment when doing it's run time calibration test, there is something seriously wrong with it. I've never had any of my APC Smart-UPS devices leave a machine unpowered after a scheduled RTC test. The whole point of them is to alert you that the battery needs replacing long before the run time drops low enough that it can't even run the test.

[@Blacklands]

You could also go with lithium batteries (they're using iron phosphate [LiFePO4], those are much less dangerous than your "typical" lithium-ion battery afaik), they are supposed to last about 10 years.

[@markbooth3066]

I did look into that the last time I replaced the batteries in one of my UPS's, but I wasn't convinced that they would be a drop in replacement at the time, and the value wasn't quite there yet. Having done more research though, I've concluded that 1) A LiFePO4 battery with a built in BMS (Battery Management System) is essential. Even my APC SmartUPS 1500RM overcharges it's batteries, and that could be very dangerous for Lithium cells, even LiFePO4, in the confined space of a UPS enclosure. 2) Finding NP7-12LFR equivalents in LiFePO4, i.e. ones with 6.35mm F2 lugs, is really difficult, most have 4.7mm F1 connectors. 3) The prices don't have to come down much to get a lower TCO, once it's less than 5x the price for 5x the lifetime, we'll be good. My only remaining concern is that since the voltage vs charge state profile for the two technologies is so different, run-time calibrations and charge state indicators will consistently offer an overly optimistic suggestion of remaining run time, so we may need to adjust server shutdown thresholds to compensate (i.e. shut down at 40% rather than at 25% etc.). Another alternative between Pb & Li might be Lead Crystal batteries, but again, at only 2x the lifetime, the cost would have to be less than 2x, to have a better Total Cost of Ownership than just buying more OEM batteries.

[@lfla0179]

I went full stupid and got myself a 1200VA UPS with a 24V external DC plug and bought two perfectly identical 50Ah car batteries in series 😂. Gotta love compact cars now! 6 minutes pfffffft... more like 30 minutes on the set that was on its way out to the recycling center. Got 8 years out of the last set. I check the voltages from time to time, and the UPS keeps them at 25V, exactly 12.5V each, nice and tidy. Given these are car batteries, I wish I could crank that up a bit, given car alternators throw 14V at them. It is a bit comical to use car connectors to a "thin" gauge wire that fits on the UPS leads, but hey, it's stupid but it works. Plus I can jump start my car with one of them in a pinch 😅. Saved me a "late for work" day more than once. And I know for a fact that a car starter is BRUTAL on batteries, pulling 600 amps for a couple seconds, so these batteries are nowhere near being abused.

[@awocrf]

when you charge these batteries to a higher voltage then you will propably last shorter

[@josemachado7830]

One of the most simple yet complicated problems in our tech market. How to select the proper UPS for your machine.

[@BikingWIthPanda]

it's probably easier to just set up n off grid solar photovoltaic array haha

[@paulwratt]

I am pretty sure I saw an APC UPS with a car battery hanging off it around 2002 in Johannesburg South Africa

[@steveatkinson2196]

UPS batteries tend to swell if you don't service them every 2-3 years. My last company had 40 locations and we regularly had to dump 2-3 UPS per year because the batteries were shot and had swelled so much they couldn't be removed without cutting the batteries into pieces. Which is a really bad idea.

[@hovant6666]

Where I live, I think it may have been over a year now since my last blackout

[@steven44799]

I have an APC smartups 1500 that I picked up with dead batteries, I extended the battery pack wires to put 2x 34/38ah batteries on it and now it will power my pc for 40 minutes.

[@mrfilipelaureanoaguiar]

Well explained video, it's maybe the reason why not many people want or think to use it. I am checking for one but a good one it's not cheap. Having a good one, if you have bad or unstable home current it will give more FPS and better overclock too with stable power. As long as the battery is not too expensive, last long and can be replaced because the circuitry won't break after the first power outage and it should be fine.

[@cobrabeebop]

22:31 was there ever a video on this tower tripp lite ups Wendell is using for his workstation? Been looking, can't find it. As far as I can tell it's a SmartPro 120V 2.2kVA 1.7kW Line-Interactive UPS Part Number: SMART2200NET ?

[@SharpRaccoonTeeth]

i litterly just installed a 5u one at work and took the old tower u2 home, taking it home on the London Underground was a bad choice

[@KiraSlith]

I have the previous model, it blew through 4 batteries in 2 years, and the one time it experienced a brown-out it killed it's 4th. I threw it in a closet afterwards. Consumer UPSes are glorifird "toys", including TrippLite's. e_e

[@jh77sly]

I have an old modified sine wave Tripplite Internet Office 480 that uses one UB1270 and I've trimmed the charge circuit pots so it charges at 13.4 instead of 14.5V and now get 7-8 years per battery. It's also in the garage with a 12V 80mm fan modded onto the front of it and it uses a 7V/12V temp switch (resistor bypass for the 7V) on the heatsink that turns the fan on full. It rarely does that, even in the summer. My Cyber Power rack mount pure sine 1500 is still on the original batteries after 7.5 years. That one is surprising me. It must not be cooking the batteries like most of them. I avoid APC now due to them using even more than 14.5V to charge batteries to get their overly optimistic run times. My older APC units seem to last about 4-5 years per battery.

[@Level1Techs]

Sounds like this needs to be a how to with pics on the l1 forums:D I have often thought of maybe making a battery "condom" product for commercial UPSes that burns off the excess voltage as heat. Tiny 8 pin micro with a good res adc kinda thing.

[@eDoc2020]

@@Level1Techs The APC Smart-UPS units can be re-calibrated via the serial port to lower the float voltage and there are guides about doing this. This (or other ways of adjusting the charger) are going to be much more efficient than burning off the excess charge power.

[@jh77sly]

@@Level1Techs It would just be disassembly and putting a meter across the batter while the UPS is plugged in and then turning the correct potentiometer to bring down the voltage. The newer UPSs all use some programmed microcontroller or static surface mount resistor ladder or some such non-adjustable circuit that I've not delved into to figure out as I find I don't have the patience for that level of reverse engineering. This is an old analog circuit UPS from the 90s. It does put out a modified sine wave instead of that dumpy square wave of the death trap you were showing in the video.

[@wallofriogrande]

How Tripplite got acquired by Eaton is despicable.

[@portwolf2293]

@tekwendell how about data center utility scale power filtering, conditioning and surge suppression? And what would you recommend at a home utility panel scale including emp forms? Edit: sorry wendell, I went down this rabbit hole before and got excited about learning about it again. I feel I've become something of a professional student as I've aged 😜

[@boneappletee6416]

Becoming a professional student is the best way to use your free time as you age! :D

[@shanent5793]

Do the UL/CSA technicians also take a "grain of salt" when testing these UPS? Just how are we supposed to size them?

[@Nobe_Oddy]

I don't understand why we wouldn't just put the UPS AFTER the PSU but BEFORE the mobo/GPU/ssd/etc.... Wouldn't it be more efficient to have a UPS outputting 12, 5. & 3 volts than 120???? I'm not electrician nor do I understand the realtions between amp, vots, and watts all that well..... so I assume this would have already been done if it was better, but I would really like to understand the differences :)

[@Blacklands]

I can't answer your question, but I know that there's at least DC-input power supplies and DC-output UPSes. So you at least skip the additional DC-AC-DC conversion in between the UPS and the power supply. But I think this is squarely in the "enterprise" market segment already, so might be pretty expensive?

[@imadecoy.]

I have a Tripp lite 1500VA 2u model I got when my office closed and they had to get rid of stuff. I tried using it but sadly the fan comes on full blast regularly and is very annoying. It even happens with no load.

[@chrisw1462]

Wait until the original battery dies, then replace it with a Lithium Iron Phosphate battery. A good one will have it's own internal protection and leveling BMS, and it can be charged by anything that can charge a 12 volt lead acid battery. It'll last ten times as long, and give you way more power per charge (if you choose one close to the same Amp-Hour rating). Choosing one a little higher than the lead-acid original is fine as long as it's not ridiculously larger.