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

UPS's and Mac Pro's

R

Rafalski24

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 27, 2009
100
0
Denver, CO
So is it stupid to run a MP without one? I have read every now and then people saying that its a mistake to run your MP without one, and my question is why? I have my computers plugged into a decent/good surge protector and very rarely have my power go out (ie. never had a brown out, <1 a year I would say on average) The chances that the power goes out when I am working on something extremely important are very low, and even if it does I have auto save saving quite often (in FCP) so I wouldn't likely loose very much time even then. So am I missing something? I can't imagine, if I were convinced to buy one, buying one that costs much more than 100USD.

thanks guys!
 
Think of it as a $100 protection scheme on your $2200+ machine. For some people it's a lost time/money thing, if damage occurs during a surge or abrupt outage. But you should be able to find an adequate one at about $100 USD, and it's probably worth it considering the expense of the machine before upgrading, and most users upgrade to the tune of anywhere from $200-$1500 in parts.
 
You really won't know what problems you have until you plug the high end UPS in.

Had the low end UPS plugged in, and every page the the color laser printed would cause the UPS to beep.

Went to storage and refurbed the monster UPS with new batteries and plugged it in, now it runs on battery for the undervolt condition the printer causes. Updated the computer next to the printer to the OK UPS and boxed up the crappy unit, and the OK UPS cries when someone prints too many pages (likely needs new batteries)/

A surge suppressor or cheap UPS likely won't cover most under/over volt conditions. Things that can and do harm the computers.

Also with the Mac Pro you are sticking a $2-5k machine on the same lines as ceiling fans, CCFLs, fans, etc. all of which create line noise which can either harm the machine or corrupt data.
 
Both my wife and my MPs are on their own UPSs and never have issues. She is a writer and even a small outage, even a few seconds, can cause her major headaches.

Since putting her system on a UPS she has not lost any work and it allows her about 25 to 30 minutes to power down. The UPS is connected to the MP and will automatically close when it reaches thresholds I've set.

Get a good, high powered UPS and you should be happy.
 
Sun Baked said:
You really won't know what problems you have until you plug the high end UPS in.

Had the low end UPS plugged in, and every page the the color laser printed would cause the UPS to beep.

Went to storage and refurbed the monster UPS with new batteries and plugged it in, now it runs on battery for the undervolt condition the printer causes. Updated the computer next to the printer to the OK UPS and boxed up the crappy unit, and the OK UPS cries when someone prints too many pages (likely needs new batteries)/

A surge suppressor or cheap UPS likely won't cover most under/over volt conditions. Things that can and do harm the computers.

Also with the Mac Pro you are sticking a $2-5k machine on the same lines as ceiling fans, CCFLs, fans, etc. all of which create line noise which can either harm the machine or corrupt data.
Click to expand...
Color lasers need quite a bit of power during print and startup. Mine (Brother MFC-9450CDN) consumes ~500W during those conditions. Idle OTOH, is just under 20W. Big difference.

The switch types can't handle it that well, as they get overloaded (looks like a brown-out to it, and can't supply adequate power with the total load; even exceeding the W output). Better units (always draws off the battery fare much better). They're more efficient, and provide more power off the battery for the same VA rating. I.e. APC's 1500VA consumer units can output 865W, while the professional units can provide 980W. That extra 95W can make a difference. ;)

Most of the consumer units also are horrible for surge suppression (~10% of what should be there). Way too weak, and need to be plugged into an additional surge suppressor unit (a decent one that can exceed 3k Joules; the higher the better).
 
Rafalski24 said:
... I have my computers plugged into a decent/good surge protector and very rarely have my power go out (ie. never had a brown out, <1 a year I would say on average) The chances that the power goes out when I am working on something extremely important are very low, and even if it does I have auto save saving quite often (in FCP) so I wouldn't likely loose very much time even then. So am I missing something? I can't imagine, if I were convinced to buy one, buying one that costs much more than 100USD
Click to expand...

My same situation exactly... I recently upgraded from an iMac to a Quad Mac Pro.

TheStrudel said:
... you should be able to find an adequate one at about $100 USD...
Click to expand...


I did some research on UPSs for a MP. It seems that "consumer grade" UPS of around $100 to $300 are not suitable for this machine. First, I researched the APC's BR1500 - which is supposed to hold enough raw power for the MP. But due to the power peak it draws when waking from sleep and/or startup surpasses the BR1500 capacity, hence powering down immediately. According to some, it has to do with the Sine Wave effectiveness over the PSU if the MP. Other say the BR1500 can work with an extra surge protector between the UPS and the computer, but that's not certain either.

Can anyone comment on this?

Sun Baked said:
You really won't know what problems you have until you plug the high end UPS in.
Click to expand...

Then there are the "Smart UPS", the professional high end ones, which cost as 3x more than the consumer ones. I researched the SUA1000 and SUA1500 ($459 and $559 resp.) - which seem to work great, and may also somehow optimize the quality of the electricity that goes into the MP and provide better protection. But the cost is nearly prohibitive though - being more like 15% of your system, depending on how many internal/external extras are hooked to it.

Nevertheless - either going the consumer or the professional route, I do think it's worth the investment, the same way insurance is. And even when the chances that a blackout occurs when working something critical - and loosing your work - may be slim, the damage to the computer due to such blackouts or brownouts, the risk for your internal drives (and the information on them), other peripherals, plus the time without the computer while its repair (and the cost of the repair itself), may well justify the cost.

For the moment, I'm just about to bite the bullet and likely buy the SUA1500 (unless anyone can recommend any consumer level alternatives based on experience with a recent model MP).

Hope this helps, and that someone can comment if/how the BR1500 has worked for them... that'll surely save me/you some money!

Thanks
 
diazj3 said:
I did some research on UPSs for a MP. It seems that "consumer grade" UPS of around $100 to $300 are not suitable for this machine. First, I researched the APC's BR1500 - which is supposed to hold enough raw power for the MP. But due to the power peak it draws when waking from sleep and/or startup surpasses the BR1500 capacity, hence powering down immediately.
Click to expand...
I've not seen or experienced this when I had an '08 MP (2.8GHz base) with a RAID card in it.

The UPS only contained the MP, monitor, DSL modem, and router though. No printer, external enclosures. (System was only tested with 4x drives).

diazj3 said:
According to some, it has to do with the Sine Wave effectiveness over the PSU if the MP. Other say the BR1500 can work with an extra surge protector between the UPS and the computer, but that's not certain either.

Can anyone comment on this?
Click to expand...
I do place a good surge between the wall and the UPS (BR1500LCD). No problems with it so far.

diazj3 said:
Then there are the "Smart UPS", the professional high end ones, which cost as 3x more than the consumer ones. I researched the SUA1000 and SUA1500 ($459 and $559 resp.) - which seem to work great, and may also somehow optimize the quality of the electricity that goes into the MP and provide better protection. But the cost is nearly prohibitive though - being more like 15% of your system, depending on how many internal/external extras are hooked to it.
Click to expand...
The SmartUPS always runs off the battery, so it's not switched between the battery and the wall as the consumer models are (BackUPS models). They're also more efficient (980W vs. 865W from the consumer version).
 
Rafalski24 said:
I have some bestbuy gift certificates to unload so I looked at their site. they have these from APC
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/APC+-+1...=1218081367657&skuId=9307797&st=APC&cp=1&lp=4

and

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/APC+-+9...=1142298456537&skuId=7842588&st=APC&cp=1&lp=5

are you guys saying these wouldn't be a good choice, do you guys see anything good there? (I have $100 bucks to spend there... so it would be nice to get it there.)
Click to expand...
They have a 1500VA version (BX1500G) available. I'm not familiar with that specific model though.
 
would it really be worth the extra $40+ bucks up from the 1300VA one? I was just looking at the specs between the two I linked to and the cheaper one has a higher joule surge protection rating, is this significant?
 
Rafalski24 said:
would it really be worth the extra $40+ bucks up from the 1300VA one? I was just looking at the specs between the two I linked to and the cheaper one has a higher joule surge protection rating, is this significant?
Click to expand...
They're both 354 Joules, which is lousy (maybe 10% of what you'd want). To offset this limitation, you'd need a decent surge suppressor between the UPS and the wall. This is what I've done, and haven't had any issues.

As per the rest of it, you just get additional power. So the larger unit can either run longer, or support a higher max load, assuming you exceed the 780W the 1300VA can produce (less likely, and if the case, you'll need a bigger unit than a 1500VA anyway :p). Higher run time is a good thing, as the battery ages. As it does, the run time will reduce for a full charge.
 
Rafalski24 said:
the APC website http://www.apcc.com/products/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=BX900R&tab=models
says that the cheaper one has a 459 joule rating. Which would you say is more important power rating or surge rating.

sorry for being a newb, but by surge suppressor you just mean surge protector right, and how decent do you mean? (10-15 buck good enough? I have a few 4-5 dollar ones but i also have a couple of slightly nicer ones)
Click to expand...
Run Time is far more important, as the Surge Ratings on them suck (either is lousy, and you need a separate surge suppressor anyway; as close to 4k Joules as you can get, and the higher the better).
 
diazj3 said:
Then there are the "Smart UPS", the professional high end ones, which cost as 3x more than the consumer ones. I researched the SUA1000 and SUA1500 ($459 and $559 resp.) - which seem to work great, and may also somehow optimize the quality of the electricity that goes into the MP and provide better protection. But the cost is nearly prohibitive though - being more like 15% of your system, depending on how many internal/external extras are hooked to it.
Click to expand...

I have the SU1400, with no extras, was $799 and is now over 10 years old (built 6/1999).

The batteries were last $150.

If you get a cheap $200 unit, I doubt you will have it past the batteries dying.

Might seen like a lot, but these units aren't consumables ... you tend to replace batteries and keep them around.

---

If you think they are too much, look around they do sell refurbs with new batteries.
 
You should look at eBay as well, I was able to get my SmartUPS 1500VA for $130. It was a re-conditioned model but came with a warranty. If you're patient you'll come out with a great UPS for half the "cost" that you find elsewhere.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back