UPS Help

P

poorimpulsectrl

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 14, 2003
Messages
228
I want to pick up a UPS for my system. There's a APC BX-800 UPS on sale at a nearby store, it says it's rated for 540 watts / 800 VA.

Will it be sufficient for my system? See sig for details, but basically 3 hard drives, a dvd burner, 21 inch monitor, x800xt vid card, p4 2.4c eating up power off a 550w power supply.

I don't really care about how much time I can run without any power, it doesn't take very long to shut down cleanly. I just want to make sure that the UPS won't be underpowering things connected to it.
 
Thank you.

One quick question - say I wanted to plugin my headphone amp also to the UPS so that my headphones / amp could be protected from surges and what not, would that be a problem ?
 
Even if the headphone amp is designed to power headphones with sensitivities of 300 ohm or more? The amp has a wall wart, I think it's 24 volts? I remember reading that clean power was a big deal to some audiophiles so I don't know if that figures in here.

Thanks again for your help.
 
Sensitivity is rated in dB. Ohms are impedance. 300 ohms would not be uncommon for headphones. The amplifier, even if inefficient and the power supply linear (inefficient), won't draw crap for power. You're looking at probably 1W max at the headphones, maybe 10W draw from AC, if that.
 
I didn't see your monitor in the sig - what are you using for a display and do you need that powered from this UPS?
 
Xeese said:
I didn't see your monitor in the sig - what are you using for a display and do you need that powered from this UPS?
Click to expand...
Ya that is an important thing to consider since monitors use alot of power especially CRTs.
 
No, it doesn't matter what he's using for a monitor. That UPS is big enough for both of my computers and my monitor. I use a 1400VA and it's loaded about 30%.
 
I have seen an APC 650 have problems with just one system, no monitor. Without doing a full analysis of what his system is actually drawing, and the various specifications in the UPS it still is a risk that a BX-800 won't be able to handle a system with a large CRT.
 
I have a Sony CPD-G520P 21 inch CRT monitor. Sorry I guess I just have part names in my sig, which can be senseless if people don't recognize them.

I ended up buying the UPS and have got my PC and my monitor plugged into the battery power sockets. I've got my headphone amp and speakers plugged in there as well. Is there any way that I could tell if insufficient power is being delivered to my system?

The light on the front of the UPS is reading green in that it's handling the load properly.

To be explicit in case my sig isn't clear , what's plugged into the 800VA / 540 watt UPS is :

Pentium 4 2.4c
3 hard drives
1 dvd burner
550 watt antec power supply
1 PCI sound card (turtle beach santa cruz)
1 usb sound card (m-audio sonica)
usb mouse
sony 21 inch monitor
headphone amp & headphones
klipsch 4.1 speakers
2 x 120mm case fans
radeon 8500 (at the moment, soon an x800 XT)
2 x 512mb ram
 
hrm, okay. is it alright if I plug it into the surge protection side?

I installed the Powerchute software and with everything plugged in as is (on battery backup side : PC, monitor, headphone amp, speakers) the current load is 216watts. So it doesn't seem as though anything is being overloaded.
 
poorimpulsectrl said:
Just out of curiosity, why would you recommend that the speakers be unplugged from the battery backup?
Click to expand...

Because the battery run time will be extended if you only run only the essentials off of it. I run my 19" Monitor, PC Tower, Cable Modem, SonicWall, and switch. Every thing else like the printers, speakers, second monitor is all running off the other outlets that only have surge protection on them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top