• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

7 hour AC mains power outage lead to 45 minutes of partial power delivery with dead desktop PC and gateway. How to protect in future?

Doodski

Doodski

Grand Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Dec 9, 2019
Messages
24,334
Likes
24,978
Location
Canada
Here's the deal: >>>
- Everything normal @ 2pm today, using PCs all good.
- After 2pm the electrical mains power cut out.
- At about 8:30pm the power cut back in.
- The electric stove element got very hot within seconds.
- The notebook PC charged from 30% to 70% quickly so the SMPS power supply worked.

The juicy parts: >>>
- The desktop PC upon power ON attempted power ON and showed the RAM illuminated, the fans not starting and everything in limbo doing nothing further.
- The cable modem/gateway was not powering ON.

I lost my mind for moments and calmly organized my strategy and plan so I kept sane.
I did the reset operations, thought maybe a breaker tripped and checked those and nope nothing.

I thought wait and think... and the only thing I could think of was when the generator was working one time when the power went out and the lights worked but not the stove... so I waited.

@ Just after 9pm the power went out again for 2 minutes, came back on and I immediately started my desktop PC and the cable modem /gateway showed flashing white LEDs which indicates networking with the network.

I smiled... LoL. Lucky StarS!

So....

I had a close call and got scared this time and was lucky.

What would I need to protect a 1kW Seasonic desktop PC power supply + a notebook PC + a gateway in the future?
 
Just buy a good UPS, plug the pooders into it (and the router), disable the beeper (I hate beepers in UPSs) and forget about it. When the power goes off, you'll know and you have plenty of time to shutdown the pooders.

If you've got brown-outs, the UPS will get you through them.
 
There were UPS's that run AC-to-DC-to-AC full time. I don't remember what they were called and I'm not sure if they are still available (they probably aren't considered "green"). That will protect you from EVERYTHING, except maybe a lighting strike that can arc-through almost anything.

Otherwise I'm not sure what you can do about a brownout other than turning everything off as soon as possible.

With some things working and some things not, you may have had a dead/bad phase. (Here in the U.S we have "split phase" with half of the house on each phase, and 240V appliances running from both phases.)
 
Yes, the AC mains power transfer was definitely not at 100% the usual. OK I'll go surf UPS's stuff. Danke and thank you very much. :D
 
If you have the budget, whole house battery solutions are getting very practical. We have a generator but it waits 30 seconds to warm up so am thinking of battery back up to cover that range. We have UPS units around the house for this 30 second coverage but their darn batteries keep dying, they beep constantly, etc.
 
amirm said:
If you have the budget, whole house battery solutions are getting very practical. We have a generator but it waits 30 seconds to warm up so am thinking of battery back up to cover that range. We have UPS units around the house for this 30 second coverage but their darn batteries keep dying, they beep constantly, etc.
Click to expand...
Thank you. I have a small system and do not require whole house protection. I should be able to purchase something that sits on the desktop off the floor?
 
I have a Cyberpower UPS protecting my comms equipment... https://www.cyberpower.com/uk/en/product/sku/cp1500epfclcd-uk

It will run my Fibre ONT, pfSense router (N100 PC), main AP and switch for around 3 hours.

My PC is protected by a cheaper APC UPS (I don't need that to run very long, it more for protection and momentary powerloss)... https://www.apc.com/uk/en/product/BX750MI/apc-backups-750va-tower-230v-4x-iec-c13-avr/

The NAS in the attic is connected to an old one of these... https://www.apc.com/hk/en/product/BE700G-UK/apc-powersaving-backups-es-700va-230v-bs1363/

The NAS in the garage is connected to... https://www.salicru.com/gb-en/sps-1100-one.html

The UPS need to be tested fairly regularly and need battery replacements every 4-5 years in my experience. The old APC is on it's 3rd battery, the Salicru on it's 2nd. The CyberPower has 2 batteries in it, so will be more expensive to replace.
 
Berwhale said:
I have a Cyberpower UPS protecting my comms equipment... https://www.cyberpower.com/uk/en/product/sku/cp1500epfclcd-uk

It will run my Fibre ONT, pfSense router (N100 PC), main AP and switch for around 3 hours.

My PC is protected by a cheaper APC UPS (I don't need that to run very long, it more for protection and momentary powerloss)... https://www.apc.com/uk/en/product/BX750MI/apc-backups-750va-tower-230v-4x-iec-c13-avr/

The NAS in the attic is connected to an old one of these... https://www.apc.com/hk/en/product/BE700G-UK/apc-powersaving-backups-es-700va-230v-bs1363/

The NAS in the garage is connected to... https://www.salicru.com/gb-en/sps-1100-one.html

The UPS need to be tested fairly regularly and need battery replacements every 4-5 years in my experience. The old APC is on it's 3rd battery, the Salicru on it's 2nd. The CyberPower has 2 batteries in it, so will be more expensive to replace.
Click to expand...
Are those lithium or sealed lead acid (gel?)?
 
Power quality monitoring might be a good application for an inexpensive oscilloscope which can be run from batteries. Because who knows what kind of power quality you were getting.

Great thing about consumer-grade UPSes is that they turn up at thrift stores for very little money, and often the only "problem" is that the former owner couldn't be bothered to replace the sealed lead acid batteries. While brands like APC have their own part #s for replacement batteries, every one that I've encountered has used off-the-shelf parts, sometimes bolted into a carrier, which can be reused. If the size and voltage are about right, and it is equipped with Faston F2-type terminals, chances are, it'll work.
 
JeffS7444 said:
Power quality monitoring might be a good application for an inexpensive oscilloscope which can be run from batteries. Because who knows what kind of power quality you were getting.

Great thing about consumer-grade UPSes is that they turn up at thrift stores for very little money, and often the only "problem" is that the former owner couldn't be bothered to replace the sealed lead acid batteries. While brands like APC have their own part #s for replacement batteries, every one that I've encountered has used off-the-shelf parts, sometimes bolted into a carrier, which can be reused. If the size and voltage are about right, and it is equipped with Faston F2-type terminals, chances are, it'll work.
Click to expand...
Yes, monitoring the AC mains is something I have done for years in the past with a electronics lab that I owned. We had a scope and really cute HP nixie tube voltmeter. We shut the shop down when it went down too low and we had beers and tokes instead and partied.
 
Doodski said:
Thank you. I have a small system and do not require whole house protection. I should be able to purchase something that sits on the desktop off the floor?
Click to expand...
Either but I would look for a) true sine wave and b) no fans! This combo is surprisingly hard to find. They have cheapened these things so much by putting no heat sinking in there and relying on fans. I have a cyberpower rackmount (1U) that is like this but the darn thing eats its batteries every 2 to 3 years, requiring expensive replacements.
 
Hi

Whole house power backup system are the solution. They are easy to install, although I would advise to have it done by an electrical contractor . The most noteworthy companies are Anker and Ecoflow and Anker and they have products around 15 Kw max that could keep substantial US houses running for several hours, at rather sane prices.

I am basically off-grid.

Peace.
 
amirm said:
Either but I would look for a) true sine wave and b) no fans! This combo is surprisingly hard to find. They have cheapened these things so much by putting no heat sinking in there and relying on fans. I have a cyberpower rackmount (1U) that is like this but the darn thing eats its batteries every 2 to 3 years, requiring expensive replacements.
Click to expand...
Thank you again, very good details and info. How stable shelf life wise (Do they overflow, leak, off-gas etc & get explosive.) are those SLA batteries in a b/u unit or have they finally progressed to lithium batteries? I dislike SLA batteries except for mobile application and applications with good air changes... I've seen firsthand several industrial explosions from them. So I am hesitant to want them/it in my living room.
 
Looks like I posted after you posted... LoL. :D
 
Sealed lead acid batteries are ideal for applications that see continuous trickle charging and not a lot of deep-cycling.
 
amirm said:
AGM
Click to expand...
For those reading this.>>
AGM means absorbent glass mat and refers to the fine glass fiber separator between the positive and negative plates that helps absorb all the battery acid. AGM Batteries are advanced lead-acid batteries.

AGM would be excellent and I can pay more for that for sure.

Hmmmz...

Lithium-Ion Battery Lasts up to Eight Years​

The BG500 UPS offers the first Lithium-ion Battery for a Net​

  • Lasts up to eight years, twice the service life of a typical UPS lead acid battery
  • Smaller and lighter than comparable lead acid batteries
  • 100 percent recyclable
  • User-Replaceable: Increases product availability by allowing you to perform upgrades and replacements of batteries with minimal effort (no tools necessary).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom