About that UPS

[kevin_standlee]

Following up on an earlier message: Just before Cheryl left for the UK, she installed UPS monitoring software on the one desktop machine. (It's always on because it may need to be accessed remotely.) With the software in place, we turned on all of the devices connected to the UPS. The software predicted that in case of power failure, the UPS would stay up for 35 minutes. Given that we rarely have everything going at once, that represents a worst-case scenario, and I think 35 minutes is enough leeway. Indeed, since what we'd probably do is take our laptop computers off the dock/ground power and run them off their own batteries, the effective life of the UPS is probably even longer, because in that case all that would need to run is the DSL modem and WAP, once the desktop machine turns off.

Speaking of which, we pulled the plug on the UPS to make sure the auto-shutdown software worked. The UPS began to bleat, and the desktop computer announced that it would shut down in a few minutes. After a few minutes, it did indeed shut down. Meanwhile, our laptop computers could still reach the internet. So that's all working, and feeling better about things here. There's only one potential hitch, and that is that the desktop machine will shut down, but will not turn back on when the power comes back up. That could get annoying if we're both away for an extended period of time. (I have the same situation at work; a few days ago, I had to have a co-worker go turn one of my computers back on because we had a power failure and that machine doesn't automatically come back up if the power fails.)

Some oddities:

1. When the UPS kicked in, the "Site wiring fault" light lit up on the power strip (manufactured by the same company that built the UPS, APC).

2. A few seconds after we we plugged the UPS back in, the power glitched briefly, causing the DSL modem to recycle and my computer on its docking station to announce that power had failed and it was disabling the dock. After the glitch, the "site wiring fault" light turned off.

Comments

[dancingguy.livejournal.com]

That would rather suck if your computer hadn't shut down. :-(

Perhaps it could use the USB connection with the computer (assuming it communicates via USB) to startup the computer. Assuming your computer can be started up via USB.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

The UPS does indeed communicate to the computer via USB cable. However, while I can set the machine to start on AC power, I don't see any way to start the machine via a signal over USB -- or if there is a way to do it, the power-management software that came with the UPS doesn't say how to do it.

[dancingguy.livejournal.com]

Well, I believe that some Macs can be started up by a power key on the keyboard, so I think it's at least possible.

OTOH, I don't know of any x86 computers that act that way, so even if it's possible, it may not help you. :-(

On the plus side, it turns out that my UPS software wasn't working on my main computer. Fortunately, this discussion caused me to check it, and now I have software that works. :-)

(It doesn't, however, have a provision for starting up my computer after it's been shut down because of a power outage.)