Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

cslewis

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jul 23, 2004
812
0
40º27.8''N, 75º42.8''W
As usual, our electricity has been flickering on and off for no good reason.(MetEd, I love you!) Yet even when our lights die and our digital appliances reawaken flashing an urgent green '12:00', my eMac stays running and fully functional. The outages only last for about 10 seconds, but our other computers, including an iMac G5, are shut off by the power loss. Why does the eMac stay on? Does it have an emergency battery or something?
 

robbieduncan

Moderator emeritus
Jul 24, 2002
25,611
893
Harrogate
CRTs take lots and lots of stable power to run. LCDs don't.

To keep the power stable for the CRT the eMac will have lots of massive capacitors. It's likely that these will keep the eMac going for the 10 seconds. As the power required for an LCD is so much less it can't survive that long on the power stored in the capacitors.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.