Yes it can be replaced. I bought this from the second hand market (as usual ) for 4000 Huf (approx 10 € now), and have placed a 12V 6Ah lead-acid (but jelly, not liquid acid) battery into it. As I told it ran my devices for almost half an hour.
I think I understand.
You mean: in the case of a blackout your devices are supported by the UPS for about half an hour.
What I meant was: there´s surely a rechargeable battery included.
It´s the 12V 6Ah lead-acid you bought.
But as any rechargeable batteries at some point reach EOL (there a only so many charging cycles to get of of them) … how long is it before you have to change the battery again?
Oh, I got it now!
I bought it in february 2023, the battery was placed then too.
The lifetime depends on usage, if it is depleted on a regular basis, it will die sooner.
Now my battery there just sits always charged, like in a car, I expect it to last like a cars battery, so 4 to 5 years.
I’ll see, I still don’t have experience about battery dying in the UPS.
I had a look at the manual.
It has a sealed lead-acid battery, and it is replaceable.
I think that device would be reasonable for a single PC.
but
It is a UPS… the only surge protection it provides is a circuit breaker , as far as I can see from the specs.
I would use it with a proper surge protector with devices like MOV’s
I like the silent operation
I agree. You want all the earth pins at every outlet to be at the same voltage, otherwise it can cause current flow between computers if you use cables.
To reply to your comment and follow up on Neville…
Blackouts occour when power is cut, usually through storms or accidents cutting the supply cable.
Brownouts dont happen as often in todays society as the generators of power control the use and prepare for high demands. But before at the breaks between tv shows the advert slot everybody put the kettle on causing bigger demands for the electricity supply, hence the suppliers reduced the available voltage to ensure you still had power but just not at the same level as normal. For a kettle it will run at 210 volt instead of 240 as normal. Kettles do not care its just a heat source, but a computer converting the voltage has trigger levels that if it fall below will stop operating.
Other examples would be the lights would dim when you put the kettle on
This is a very simple explination and based on uk power lines. 240 volts, In europe its 220 volts and in the states 110. Technically not correct but close in laymans terms.
Not had a brown out for more years than i care to remember, but it used to be monday at 8 when the factories started up, and excess power at 6 when they closed.
They are getting more common again here. Solar power is difficult to manage. We also get voltages going over 240v when there is too much supply from house rooftops… a reverse-brownout.
I thought with a type of surge protection it would be possible to stop the system supplying too much power, but yes it would lead to other issues, like how do you get rid of the excess, except in the form of donating it to the grid or in the form of heat.
I am not convinced solar is the answer…
Polution in creation and recycling
Does not work above set temperature as efficiently
Is great when the sun is shining (ok not quite true) but we need power when its dark for light and heating which means stocking it (batteries)
Roofs and buildings ok, but converting fields from food to power NO
Not all buildings are suitable due to weight, position, heat generation, fire risk
The list is not endless, ok I understand FREE power.
The trend in france now is to cover supermarket car parks to gain power to run the place, and offer covered areas to park, in theory win win.
We are talking about it in our village, setting aside one area to offer this, and use the power to heat our pools for free. But we lack parking in summer so this would make it worse due to extra space needed for structures. Plus everyone would want their place, then to charge their electic cars for free… complex discussion … we all have views on.
Yes you can regulate voltage, overs and unders.
You can also filter the frequency… that tends to be an issue with power from generators… like when the grid fails and I get out the petrol generator… noisy beast… we had to run it for a week one time when a storm took out power poles
When I left the UK some 20 years ago, we toured europe in a camping car, spending most of our time in Portugal, these were the days before solar panels were popular or cost effective or delivered enough power. The big dread was to station ourselves near another van who had a generator as the noise all night was just a pain in the ass. But as we were wild camping for free, hard to complain to the owner.
We only used camp sites once a month to top up electric, water, do washing etc.
I watched a doco about the power grid in the UK - was interesting - probably in the early 2000’s ? - the SCADA guys in the control room sit there and monitor usage - just before Eastenders finished - they would dial in extra power from France to accommodate all the tea kettles “going online” to make a cuppa after Eastenders finished… I guess they can’t do that now since Brexit?
Also - when I get a decent fore-warning - I just everything down that I can - especially my NAS… That did happen once in the last 2-3 years (the Covid and post-Covid years seem to have melded into one long continuum)… But every other time it happens without warning…
And yeah - sometime its as simple as trying to make some toast while the dishwasher and clothes drier are going - and it will Tripp (sic) a fuse… Thank god for flipswitch fuses - I can still remember wrapping fuse wire around the white china fuse holder in the meterbox… I had a habit of tripping fuses at house we lived in - I was about 11 or 12 - fascinated by electricity - had a Hornby trainset transformer - and loved the sparks when arching “+” to “-” and the smell too (is that ozone?) - so I wanted to see what would happen with I did that with 240 volts (I wore rubber gloves!) …
Was discussing that in a recent email with my younger brother - it was lucky I did that when my mum was home - she knew how to replace the fuse - if it had been my dad, who was utterly useless for anything remotely practical - he’d have just left us without power overnight (and maybe for days - till he summonsed up the courage to go to a phone booth and ring a sparky, or the landlord).
We got away from that when our old farmhouse had a complete rewire. We spent heaps, put in 3 power circuits, one of which only does the office and front bedroom. So computers in Office almost have their own power circuit.
Never had a fuse flip since.
It pays to do an overkill with house wiring.
They are devices that absorb a power surge. A very lsrge surge can cause them to self destruct.
A circuit breaker is switch that disconnects if current is excessive.
It seems the same as Laszlo’s
I dont know… it depends on what sort of sensor trips the circuit breaker… you want it to be high sensitivity and rapid so it does not let any surge through before it acts.
You also want protection on all 3 wires… circuit breakers normally only work on the active wire.
In the UK to work in the garden I always used a circuit breaker in case I cut the power cord when doing the hedge or grass. In france its built in to the main circuit fuse box. Yes still called that even if we no longer have fuses in the distribution box.
Normally here called a elcb earth leakage circuit breaker.
But its not suitable for computer protection, we also use a system in the plug board for lightening strikes which are very common, not everybody uses them as they add to the expence.
Thanks for the explanation.
In the meantime I also found this one:
Metal Oxide Varistors (MOVs) are bidirectional and non-linear surge suppressor devices that are widely used for limiting voltage during a surge or transient event in a broad variety of applications.
These highly reliable and robust overvoltage protection devices are available
in multiple form factors and surge protection ranges.
Well, basically you are saying the device László uses and the one I was referring to (both of them Eaton devices) are not good enough for compuer protection
The manual that comes with them lists computers as use cases though:
Plug critical equipment
(computer, monitor, modem,
etc.) into the outlets 6 providing
battery backup power and surge
protection (see figure B), taking
care not to exceed the rated current
indicated in amperes.
Basically its the load you can put on a circuit, just how much it can carry without overloading or failing.
On average, laptops use about 30 to 70 watts of electricity.
Large desktop and gaming computers use between 200 and 500 watts of electricity, on average.
An average ink-jet which is designed for home use will typically use 30 to 50 watts when it is printing, in standby mode most printers will draw around 3 to 5 watts of power.
Monitors (around 12-16 inches): Usually around 4-10 watts.
So as a very rough calculation if you had a big games machine thats about 2 amp (watts divided by 220 volts) using ohms law to calculate.
The MAXIMUM amperage the circuit can handle is probably 15 Amps (total). In reality, you should not load this past 80% continuously. So the most you can load it up to is 12 amps (continuous).
So 4 computers with screens and shared printer … is safe on this circuit.
I take into account rounding errors and best guess on your equipment.
If you look on the back of your equipment it will give better information to do the calculation.
Please note you should NEVER plug extensions or further power distribution into these devices to get a longer range. Or use extension cables with these things. They come with an optimum length cable.
) for 4000 Huf (approx 10 € now), and have placed a 12V 6Ah lead-acid (but jelly, not liquid acid) battery into it. As I told it ran my devices for almost half an hour.
…
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