Superguide: CyberPower PFCLCD UPS Mini-Towers protect your home's computers and entertainment

[@macinman]

Hi everyone, I have the 1350VA 810 watts model on a 27" 5k iMac, with a desk lamp (with LED bulb) and an external hard drive. I'm really pleased with the performance. Last time I tested the unit, gave me about 80-90 minutes runtime especially after the display goes to sleep. I have the iMac set to shut down after 5 minutes on battery, and then the UPS set to turn off 3 minutes after that if power isn't restored. I have the UPS to turn back on automatically after power is restored. I have a second smaller APC unit for the networking stuff such as modem / router as they are in physical different locations. What I found strange was the CyberPower units don't come with the battery disconnected like the APC units do. I thought by law they had to. Anyway great video, just wanted to share my experience with my model of UPS in this product line. Have a great day!

[@johnantonopoulous6381]

To let you know it should drop in wattage as well. Once it fully charged.

[@dmann3042000]

Have a Denon AVR S900W reciver, and with 55 QLED, and the unit barely has any pull from the wall or on Display. Subs are on a different Brick, but TV, AVR, Modem NAS box, and Router are on this unit, being the 1000W version, and has very little load on it.

[@bass7lb]

The bulb flicker is not a problem. All computer power supplies should be designed to comply with the "cbema curve". This allows a temporary loss of power but not too long or the SMPS (power supply) will cut out. Google "cbema curve" for more info

[@TinkerTry]

Great info, thank you! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Committee_for_Information_Technology_Standards

[@unsealedabsurdfiles]

+bass7lb - yep, indeed transformers in PSUs have a natural energy storage for a split second, which helps too

[@porvenirlopez]

Hello, I bought this product and detected that when the no-break is turned off, all items connected to the Surge modules keep energized, only the items connected on the surge+battery modules does not have energy... It's expected ? For example.. If you connect a tv on the Surge modules,, whit the no-break in off mode, TV is able to power on... I appreciate your feedback.. Thank you

[@TinkerTry]

I'm not sure honestly, so sorry.

[@rgraz4929]

Is it possible the wattage of the connected devices could be low enough to not register any wattage usage. I connected a modem, router, and ATA(voip) to my Cyberpower 1500va/900watt unit and it's output is registering 0kw, 0va, 0% with a max est. runtime of 427 minutes. Maybe it's below the min threshold, whatever that may be, to register anything? Also, when you plug the bulb in, does it say 54 watts or 54 kw? My Cyberpower UPS only has a Kw reading. Not sure why.Thx.

[@FirstLastOne]

I find the rackmount Cyberpower UPS will display kilowatts while all my desktop models display watts.

[@hamjatjallomybah740]

What happens when you connect a desktop computer?

[@kwd57]

I have a question, when you showed how fast the 60 watt bulb dropped the remaining run time. Was it because it really wasn't charged fully? Did you try the same test after fully charging it? I am considering the 1500 watt version, but I was not very impressed on how fast only a 60 watt bulb drained it down. I want to hook up a large tower,cable modem, 2 routers, a 8 port switch, cordless telephone, sprint airave, led/lcd monitor, and some assorted wall adapters. I have no idea the total wattage of these things, but I am thinking even the 1500 watt version will not be able to handle the load for very long. I have been running these things for about 25 years without one, but I would like to try one. Thanks, for the video and any thoughts you may have.

[@TinkerTry]

kwd57 Well, I'm not sure, but I believe it was likely just showing the new estimated runtime based on the new load I was applying. I think it might be helpful for you to hook up a watt meter first, to get some idea of what all your stuff actually uses when under normal workloads, so you can size appropriately. I shutdown within a minute of power off, so for me, runtime wasn't a big consideration, but it does sound like you're a good candidate for the 1500. Hope you can let us know how it goes!

[@Ironbuket]

8:38 Wasting 9W? Don’t you realise it is monitoring the power waiting to step in if there is a problem? If it did that using 0W it would be magic. 16:18 What do you mean you cant use a sound bar because it is too powerful? A sound bar might use up to 50W. Even the lowest unit in this range is rated up to 300W of devices being connected. The 1000VA model in this video should handle over 600W of devices. Are you implying that a single device using over 50W cant be used with one of these UPSs? How come people are using them with PCs then...

[@JustAn0th3rY0uTub3Channel]

Thanks for putting this up.. explained the partial charge showing on a similar unit. I'll be charging mine over night.

[@idknuttin]

i want to buy a backup ups just so if they power goes out i can safely turn off all of my electronics, i don't really want it to use electronics for hours during a blackout. my question is how do i know how many watts or voltage i will need to backup a ps4, a 42 inch lg plasma, and an xbox 360. How much power would a mid range gaming desktop need to keep it running long enough to power down during a blackout?

[@TinkerTry]

idknuttin Hard to know, without specs of computer, try this site:www.antec.outervision.com/index.jspAs far as the TV and PS4, you'll want to use google around and find specs, or even better, use an actual watt-burn measuring device to see how much is needed, during normal use, something like this:amzn.to/1A7IIUCIn general, you won't regret buying big if you can afford to, especially if you plan to play your consoles and leave the TV on for more than say 30 seconds (to allow for a graceful shutdown).

[@intactgreen7564]

Does it make a buzzing noise when unplugged from the wall outlet?

[@TinkerTry]

Yes, a low pitch noise, heard from up to about 10 feet away in a quiet room. I'll be trying out the redesigned unit: CyberPower CP1500PFCLCD PFC Sinewave UPS System, 1500VA/1000W, 12 Outlets, AVR, Mini Tower www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00429N19W/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 and we'll see if it's a little quieter, more suited for bedroom use for instance.

[@oscardelta1257]

I have this same exact unit and I have a question... It shows the wattage output between 138-156 (it constantly changes every few seconds). I have a PC with a 300 watt power supply, 21.5 inch LED back-lit monitor, cable modem, router and two NAS units plugged into the battery protected outlets. My Question: Wouldn't that be outputting way more wattage than its showing? I mean the power supply on my PC alone is 300 watts, I don't know what wattage the 21.5 LED back-lit monitor uses or the cable modem, router and NAS units use... I've have run several self-tests on it via the provided software an its held the power. After the initial drop in battery time (it starts out at 21 mins of battery backup) I think it said I had something 9-10 minutes of battery backup. The equipment I have plugged into the battery supported outlets are as follows: 1) Velocity Micro PC with standard 300 watt power supply 2) Asus 21.5 inch LED back-lit monitor connected via DVI to PC 3) Motorola Internet cable modem 4) NetGear WNDR4500 N900 dual band gigabit router 5) Buffalo LinkStation Pro 1 TB high performance NAS 6) Synology DS212j NAS running two 1 TB WD SATA III red drives I originally started off with just the first 5 pieces of equipment then I decided to add the Synology NAS. It didn't really up the wattage usage that much after adding the second NAS, maybe 10 watts give or take a few watts... Obviously the unit isn't overloaded or the internal breaker would trip inside of the unit and I'd have to push the red button on the back to reset it and some kind of message would display on my PC. The unit actually did hold during a lightning storm a couple of weeks ago, we had several short power interruptions during the storm...

[@TinkerTry]

Well, in my experience with hardware roughly similar, the estimates of the max power the device could draw tend to be very high, compared to the actual watt burn during normal use, after initial power up. It'd tax that power supply to be near max 300 watt fulltime. The good test of your right-sizing your UPS is that you're able to power everything up without incident, perhaps even concurrently, without overload warnings on UPS. Something like an individual outlet watt meter does seem to be more sensitive, such as the popular Kill A Watt EZ amzn.to/1nDeyDF (the PFCLCD display does move around in large watt increments). I'll make some guesstimates, about how much the watt burn goes up, when you plug in each of these additional devices (into your PFCLCD UPS): 1) Velocity Micro PC with standard 300 watt power supply 100 to 150 watts, depending upon workload 2) Asus 21.5 inch LED back-lit monitor connected via DVI to PC 35 watts 3) Motorola Internet cable modem 8 watts 4) NetGear WNDR4500 N900 dual band gigabit router 15 watts 5) Buffalo LinkStation Pro 1 TB high performance NAS 60 watts 6) Synology DS212j NAS running two 1 TB WD SATA III red drives 50 watts Thanks for sharing, and for commenting!

[@oscardelta1257]

***** Thanks for the reply! Interesting, that puts me at about 318 watts (using 150 watts for the PC)...A little bit over half for this unit... I never completely power down the PC, I put it in sleep mode, everything else stays running 24/7...The biggest reason I bought this unit is because we have many split second power interruptions. I'm located in Florida and we get thunderstorms almost everyday in the summer months and then we get at least one split second interruption at least once a month for no apparent reason. I'll look into the watt meter, always wanted to get one of those! Thanks for doing the guesstimate wattage calculations...

[@HalkerVeil]

Getting harder to find people who really know what they talk about on KZbin. Mostly kids who just review things because they think it's 'cool'. However this video is helpful beyond anything I expected.

[@GregoryCunningham]

Mine came fully charged as well. Not sure why they put that warning on there.

[@Ironbuket]

My guess is because some people may buy it and try to power stuff off it straight out of the box without ever charging it. The battery level will degrade over time and they have no way to know how long your box will sit on a shelf before it gets sold.

[@zrepe]

Hi Paul ! can you tell me please how loud is the fan and when it`s start ? it kicks in frecvently ? it disturb your sleep in a silent room ? Best Regards

[@TinkerTry]

+P.Robert No fan, but a faint buzz (no loud click) when it rarely kicks in (you can alter sensitivity to voltage changes), likely fine in a bedroom, especially if it’s more than say 4 feet away. Hope this helps a little.

[@straya_au318]

is it safe to run gaming computer

[@russaal9562]

Hi thank you for the gréât review! i own the same.would like to Know if its safe for my stuff if it show 122-123V? Is it normal that this wont regulate over voltage? Can you setup for less input? Thankx

[@TinkerTry]

+user5860 yamha Way out of scope for anything I should try to answer, please contact CyberPower directly www.cyberpowersystems.com/support/overview.html or an electrician. My understanding is that this sort of device will not continuously adjust voltage, it can merely kick when when too high or low, until the battery is depleted.

[@Chris-py3ec]

Does that fan noise stay on all the time?

[@TinkerTry]

Chris D No, only noise is when line-power is gone (and battery is providing power).

[@Chris-py3ec]

Thanks Paul!

[@aziaelion3429]

If I plugged this into a surge protector would that give me any problems?

[@TinkerTry]

Thank you for asking this excellent question! I found this, from: www.cyberpowersystems.com/support/faqs/general-ups-faqs.html "Can I hookup a surge strip to the UPS unit? Surge strips cannot be installed before OR after the UPS unit. Doing so will void the UPS’s warranty. If you require additional units, please upgrade your UPS to a unit that has more outlets. If you need a longer input cord, you can purchase a UL certified extension cord that is rated for the respective current of the unit. This cord MUST be a single-outlet extension cord."

[@TinkerTry]

***** I have now made appropriate updates to the SuperGuide, thanks again! TinkerTry.com/superguide-cyberpower-pfclcd-ups-mini-towers-protect-your-homes-computers-and-entertainment

[@gertwallen]

***** Hi Paul and thanks for your thorough review. Cyberpower warns that the "cord MUST be a single-outlet extension cord", however at 07:45 you plug a double outlet one. Can you do that? If so, what about multiple outlet ones to extend the number of outlets available out of this unit? Thanks

[@kbent88]

The battery obviously isn't fully charged and that's why its pulling 10 watts at idle....

[@TinkerTry]

+kbent88 Exactly. I'll try a meter on another similar unit I have, with nothing else plugged in, and see what it says, when already fully charged. Thanks!

[@TinkerTry]

+Paul Braren Just plugged in, will wait for full charge and re-check, says 4 watts now (with no devices plugged in to UPS).

[@kbent88]

Thats good to hear. 10 watts at idle is way too much! haha Thanks!

[@TinkerTry]

+kbent88 Yep, 8 hours later, still 4 watts on the Kill A Watt EZ, with no devices plugged in to the PFCLCD1000.

[@kbent88]

That's a shame. Thanks for the response!

[@vorkev1]

you just showed me how cheap the unit is made the bulb should not flicker at all the whole point of a ups is to prevent sudden voltage change that can damage sensitive equipment.

[@trumpafarian7129]

What happens if your computer is on and you aren't home...... Then the power goes out. I like to leave my computer running so I can run my sniper program. If the battery dies, I assume the computer would still have a power outage. Is there is a way to set your computer to shutdown right after the battery kicks in?

[@Bdubslawman]

Hey, I would just like to point out that if you want the LONGEST battery life from your units, you DO NOT want to run tests like this. 1st thing you should do is fully charge the unit, depending on the state of charge the battery comes in for some batteries this can be the better part of a day. That doesn't mean you can't power on the unit and put in to service if you have to but you shouldn't be doing ANY TESTING with it. IF your home does not have clean power and this unit is kicking over to battery back up more than it's monthly test (APCs) then consider a whole house power filter attached at your service panel area if you power company is not able to resolve the problem. Some people think it is a good idea to TEST the run time of their UPS, some people do this frequently; this DRAMATICALLY shortens the life expectancy of the battery. Not ever home or office can instantly shut down protected/needed devices but you should make ever possible effort to do so if you care about getting the most life out of your UPS battery. I am talking about getting 5-8 years VS. the more common 1-3 years from the crowd who test their units frequently (or have dirty/unclean power). I do not recommend turning off the alarm even in the middle of the night. BECAUSE kicking over to battery back up should be a VERY RARE occurrence even on high sensitivity if the power coming to your home is clean. If the alarm goes off you should be sprinting to find out what the problem is and simultaneously shutting off any device drawing power from the UPS. Until the problem is correctly. So no TV, no Blu-ray player etc. (Is it all the UPSs, or just the one. Is the power out? If it's all the UPS you have and the power is still on...it could be some external event. One Hot summer my UPS started howling in the late afternoon despite power still coming into the house it lasted the entire shut down process & continued. So I shut everything down and pulled the UPS from the wall as I suspected a wave of brown downs (too low voltage power coming to the house). It turned out the local sub-station was failing under the strain, it took out the electronic control module on the house AC/Furnace and thankfully that was all, but had I shut the alarms off I would not have been spurred into action. One final note. Prior to any electrical thunderstorm: Shut off all UPS and unplug them from wall as well as removing any back door ways for surges to come in. It's not enough just to pull the power from the wall. You need to disconnect coaxial TV cable to your UPS if it's connected, also from your Satellite/Cable box which then connects to your TV). If lightening hits close enough it can arc right thru your house and a UPS isn't going to stop a bolt of lightening that can arc from one end of your house to the other. While that's rare, It's not uncommon for it to disrupt and cause a surge that travels along power lines into nearby homes or to hit utility lines or cause a surge their like at a satellite dish or the neighborhood cable feed which results in you and your neighbors with fried cable boxes and damaged maybe fried TVs or HDMI ports etc..

[@TinkerTry]

Bdubslawman All good points, thank you for taking the time to share with the viewers of this video! Let's just say I took this one for the team, knowing full well most folks that are: buying from Amazon fresh stock seeing a nearly full battery will likely put it into service right away, especially when say installling one for a relatives TiVo during the few hours of holiday time you're visiting. Not idealy, but better than doing nothing at all. That said, most of my many other deployments of this series of batteries in family member homes have involved leaving it plugged in overnight before driving it over. Thanks again!

[@420bars]

I plug a UPS to another UPS to keep it powered up in case of an outage.

[@xValsion]

trying to be funneh eh

[@enkrypt3d]

my 1500PFCLCD was DOA.. it would not go on battery 90% of the time... RMA on the way. really hoping the new one is better

[@rojo8394]

this is enough for a computer with a 650w power supply 80+ bronze certification, and the ups of 850va is atractive too.

[@TinkerTry]

+ROJO 83 I've actually moved to a sub-100-watt device, even when fully loaded with drives, TinkerTry.com/superservers which gives me more time to shut down all my VMs TinkerTry.com/configure-automated-shutdown-homelab-datacenter-15-minutes

[@natireson4140]

Thanks !

[@drpeemac]

Brilliant !

[@poewrcwups8039]

👍

[@marrngtn]

Great info

[@oscardelta1257]

Paul, Here is something that may interest your viewers or perhaps yourself. I know you have a video on how to configure automated shutdown of NAS during a power outage which I'm guessing is for a more elaborate setup of computers and UPS systems. There is a simple solution that CyberPower has to enable your PC/Mac/Linux to shutdown your NAS for those that don't have an elaborate setup... I have used the instructions in the CyberPower link below which enables my PC to shutdown my NAS drives in the event they are running on battery power for 5 minutes but you can make the shutdown for anytime you want...Most people should be able to handle it, the instructions are easy to follow and only take a few minutes. www.cyberpowersystems.com/user-manuals/AN1302_1126.pdf

[@eastendbillythekid802]

If you love a fucking annoying beeping noise while your powers out then buy this shitty annoying fucking crap power backup. After all my rants very well made and nice just please make a switch so I can turn off the annoying beeping noise!!!! make and option switch!

[@oscardelta1257]

Umm yeah, obviously you didn't look at the video, there is an alarm silence button right on the front! This UPS can be programmed to keep the beep muted permanently by simply holding in the alarm button for a couple of seconds and you'll never hear the "annoying beeping noise" again...