Need help finding a UPS for an Active PFC PSU

[blanketyblank]

I'm looking for a good UPS for my PC. I'm using an APC 550VA now, and just ordered a CyberPower 1500VA because of the great reviews and features.
such as:
http://www.hardwarelogic.com/n...E/1376/2007-05-11.html
http://benchmarkreviews.com/in...sk=view&id=82&Itemid=1

However after placing my order I discover a review on newegg with a reply by the manufacturer (see below). I've got a PC using an Antec NeoPower 550Watt PSU which does Active PFC. Will this thing still work or should I go return it when it arrives.
How important is finding a PSU that produces a true sinewave? I've got a 42" panasonic plasma TV as well which is why I wanted to upgrade, but how will this affect that?
Thanks for any help, and if you have any suggestions about what UPS I could actually get that would work that would be wonderful. Preferrably something at Bestbuy or Staples
so I can return it if it doesn't work out.



Pros: works well with Linux

Cons: very bad power output - not even close to a sine wave...
as a result, 2 out of the 6 computers I tested on it don't work. One has an older Antec TruePower 550, the other a Rosewill 650W power supply. Rosewill one doesn't power on, the Antec one doesn't find the sata dvd drive and crashes often. When run on street power or off an aging APC unit, they both work great.

Other Thoughts: Comparable APC units are not much more expensive - don't make the same mistake I did and hope you can save yourself a few bucks...
Manufacturer Response:Thank you for your comments on the CP1500AVRLCD. In regards to the UPS not outputting a ?true? sinewave, you are correct; the output waveform of this device is a simulated sinewave. Computers which utilize a PFC (Power Factor Correction) power supply will only function correctly with a Sinewave UPS ? which can be found in CyberPower?s Professional line of UPS systems. Most mainstream PC?s on the market do NOT have PFC power supplies, so these UPSs operate flawlessly under typical conditions. Thank you for your feedback, and sorry for the confusion. CyberPower Systems.

 

[HOOfan 1]

That newegg review, like most newegg reviews is BS and just plain stupid. What would recognizing an SATA drive have to do with the UPS? Not to mention the sine wave versus simulated sine wave only comes into effect with a line interactive UPS when the voltage drops and it starts running off of the battery...not full time.

I have seen this discussion before and usually it ends up that for people running on 110-120V power it doesn't matter, but for those on 220-240V it might not be a good idea.

Edit: If you want true sine wave I know that the APC Smart-UPS series are True Sine Wave...but also cost about twice as much as the simulated sine wave models

 

[beray]

@blanketyblank

It's very easy to find true sinewave UPS, the VA rating is derived from the root-mean-square of their true output power, anything else would be simulated or non-sinusoidal UPS versions. Here you go...

http://www.google.com/products...roup&resnum=1&ct=title
http://www.google.com/products...roup&resnum=1&ct=title

 

[blanketyblank]

Thanks for the reply. I got it today, and it seems to work. At least with the power on. I haven't tried unplugging it yet.
It seems that on load with the TV on with a bright screen I draw about 600 watts or so which explains why things go wrong when I'm using my current supply.

So I take it that I should not be worried about getting a true sine wave supply if it works, or are there problems that may develop that I don't know about?

 

[beray]

Originally posted by: blanketyblank
Thanks for the reply. I got it today, and it seems to work. At least with the power on. I haven't tried unplugging it yet.

Go ahead, try out the UPS functions by unplugging the UPS from the wall outlet with everything else in normal power up. It's a "LINE-INTERACTIVE UPS" AKA "OFF-LINE UPS", going on-line with power transfer time of 4ms.

It actually be fully functional within 4 ms when there's line power loss, make sure it made no funny noise under real loads as well as with no power loading at all (turn your system(s) on then also off while there's no line power to the UPS). No noticeable difference on a good UPS under all conditions, more noticeable as their quality went down.

Originally posted by: blanketyblank
It seems that on load with the TV on with a bright screen I draw about 600 watts or so which explains why things go wrong when I'm using my current supply.

It's a 900W UPS, max continous power usage until the battery drop dead is 675W, this included extra 3dB margin for zero possible failure rate. (As power usage inch-up toward 900W, possible failure rate goes up above zero... And at 900W usage the possible failure rate is one in four - Typically while power on or off).

Originally posted by: blanketyblank
So I take it that I should not be worried about getting a true sine wave supply if it works, or are there problems that may develop that I don't know about?

If you don't know and can't recognize problems you have then they would not bug you, especially if the problems are not out right detrimental.

For example - the hi-order in the non-sinusoidal output UPS "can" really cause bothersome display problem below. Tho some people can't see, can't detect, nor recognize the bothersome problems on their screen.

http://www.rage3d.com/board/sh...p?s=&threadid=33672888

They can also do the same thing to audio systems with different resultant problem effects. Tho some people can't hear, can't detect, nor recognize the bothersome problems on their ears.

 

[blanketyblank]

Thank you so much for the link to that thread.
I've finally found the source of my display problems which were intermittent flashes on my screen. I thought it might be power related after I tried replacing components to eliminate the video card and TV itself as a possible source of the strange flickers.
I thought it might be the power draw from the outlet might be too high at times causing the flicker, but now it seems the culprit is actually the frequency.
I thought it was a little strange that setting my video card to 59 Hz seemed to reduce the problem over 60 Hz. Since my system actually draws only about 200 watts maximum at least as far as I tried stressing it without the TV I think I'll see if there is a cheap true sine wave UPS in that range.

 

[Zepper]

I don't know of any true sine UPS that's reasonably priced. I've used my little Cyberpower 550VA UPS along with my Antec EA380W and my Zippy 500W PSUs both of which have aPFC (active PFC) and auto voltage compensation and both seem to work fine. However I haven't had (or caused by the "Test" button) a power outage since I've changed from a CRT to an LCD display. I guess I'll have to do that and see how my new screen does...

.bh.

 

[blanketyblank]

Originally posted by: beray
@blanketyblank

It's very easy to find true sinewave UPS, the VA rating is derived from the root-mean-square of their true output power, anything else would be simulated or non-sinusoidal UPS versions. Here you go...

http://www.google.com/products...roup&resnum=1&ct=title
http://www.google.com/products...roup&resnum=1&ct=title

Hmm so does that mean the calculation is something like dividing the VA rating by the square root of 2 then rounding? I've found I don't need something quite so powerful anymore so I'm going to look at the smaller smart-UPS line, but it seems their wattages don't seem to work out with that unless they do some funky rounding.

 

[SparkyJJO]

Originally posted by: blanketyblank
Thank you so much for the link to that thread.
I've finally found the source of my display problems which were intermittent flashes on my screen. I thought it might be power related after I tried replacing components to eliminate the video card and TV itself as a possible source of the strange flickers.
I thought it might be the power draw from the outlet might be too high at times causing the flicker, but now it seems the culprit is actually the frequency.
I thought it was a little strange that setting my video card to 59 Hz seemed to reduce the problem over 60 Hz. Since my system actually draws only about 200 watts maximum at least as far as I tried stressing it without the TV I think I'll see if there is a cheap true sine wave UPS in that range.

The UPS will only be not true sine wave when on battery backup mode. When running idle, you are getting a feed straight from the wall and that should be a true sine wave unless you just have dirty electricity in your area. A true sine wave UPS wouldn't help you in this case.

 

[Zepper]

Some UPS (aka true UPS) drive the load full time (no switchover time). Those are all sine wave and VERY expensive.

.bh.

 

[blanketyblank]

but would an online battery ( the kind where power always goes through the battery) UPS fix dirty power?

 

[HOOfan 1]

Originally posted by: blanketyblank
but would an online battery ( the kind where power always goes through the battery) UPS fix dirty power?

absolutely that is what they are specifically designed for

 

[beray]

Originally posted by: blanketyblank
Hmm so does that mean the calculation is something like dividing the VA rating by the square root of 2 then rounding?

Yes, all sinusoidal versions followed the root-mean-square rule. non-sinusoidal versions can't use root-mean-square directly, they used root-mean-square rule + additional 3dB (also known as standard deviation to non EE) error compensation for being non-sinusoidal.

Originally posted by: blanketyblank
I've found I don't need something quite so powerful anymore so I'm going to look at the smaller smart-UPS line, but it seems their wattages don't seem to work out with that unless they do some funky rounding.

You'll find it just like with PSU labels, the cheap ass models often came with illiterate label specifications. Illiterate labels made them look better than actually they are to the illiterate customers.

Originally posted by: blanketyblank
but would an online battery ( the kind where power always goes through the battery) UPS fix dirty power?

online versions do not mean the "power always goes through the battery", some would be but others do not, some used internal buffered store power which could be sourced from wall outlets, batteries, gas/diesel generators, and all of them together at any time with zero power transfer time.

If you live within the United States or Japan, the chance that you have dirty power is very low but not impossible. 99.99% of the time the dirty power symptoms originated by mistakes made within the location/house or within the equipments used, a pure sinewave UPS will not undo the mistakes causing these problems.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: beray
online versions do not mean the "power always goes through the battery", some would be but others do not, some used internal buffered store power which could be sourced from wall outlets, batteries, gas/diesel generators, and all of them together at any time with zero power transfer time.

It's parts of your posts like the above that make me always go "wtf?"

 

[Zepper]

Yup, VL, sounds like BS to me. I've never seen a true/full time UPS that doesn't drive the load from the battery at all times - all the AC side is for is to keep the battery charged. Someone shows me one that drives the load from anything other than the battery (or batteries), I might change my mind... Line interactive UPSes have a VR transformer so they don't have to switch to battery for some brownouts etc. The cheapest that are simply called battery backups don't have any VR and are either on battery or AC with an approx. 4 mS switch time. Something like that should be all you need for a nice PSU with its own voltage compensation which can deal with minor brownouts on its own.

.bh.

 

[beray]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry

Originally posted by: beray
online versions do not mean the "power always goes through the battery", some would be but others do not, some used internal buffered store power which could be sourced from wall outlets, batteries, gas/diesel generators, and all of them together at any time with zero power transfer time.

It's parts of your posts like the above that make me always go "wtf?"

Ummm.Ah... "wtf?" is a perfectly good question...

A particular UPS is always online and generated output destination power from an internal power buffer. In turn this intermediate power buffer store is replenish from multiple power sources simultaneously whatever the sources maybe.

The intermediate power buffer hence could handle loss of one or more power sources and would still be online with no service interruption to output destination, and with zero power transfer time from one source to another.

Practically all ON-LINE UPS used the technique.

Originally posted by: Zepper
Yup, VL, sounds like BS to me. I've never seen a true/full time UPS that doesn't drive the load from the battery at all times - all the AC side is for is to keep the battery charged. Someone shows me one that drives the load from anything other than the battery (or batteries), I might change my mind... Line interactive UPSes have a VR transformer so they don't have to switch to battery for some brownouts etc. The cheapest that are simply called battery backups don't have any VR and are either on battery or AC with an approx. 4 mS switch time. Something like that should be all you need for a nice PSU with its own voltage compensation which can deal with minor brownouts on its own.

.bh.

There actually exist EEs stupid enough to pull 15A from an 18AH lead-acid battery continuously forever non-stop? While also super-charging the battery at the same time?