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Idea: Small UPS Batteries in iMacs

faroZ06

faroZ06

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Apr 3, 2009
3,387
1
The iMac is supposed to be an all-in-one, and it does a pretty good job of eliminating all wires and extra stuff, but what you still need sometimes is an external UPS to prevent it from going down in power hiccups or small outages.

How about putting a small laptop battery in the iMacs so they can survive a small power outage, maybe 60 seconds? And have the screen turn off to conserve power during the outage. If Apple can fit a battery in the super-thin MBPR that can power it for 7 hours, they could fit a battery in the iMac strong enough to keep it alive for a minute.
 
Do people really have that many short power outages that a 60 second tide over would be worth it? Brownouts/blackouts in my area tend to last quite a bit longer (hours+). And if you need it to keep going long enough to save/shutdown, you're going to have to run the backlight on the monitor. The other problem I see is the lead-acid cells tend to go bad over time and need replacement.

A super-cheap UPS/powerstrip runs <$40, and would give you at least a 5 minute run time. I use an old APC XS 1500 for a more serious runtime, and it has pretty good over volt protection as well (my friend unfortunately had the opportunity to test it, and a lot of stuff not behind the UPC got fried).

Just seems like added expense/complexity for a 0.01% customer base who'd use it, and easy enough to handle outside the box. Plus the 27" is already heavy enough IMAO.
 
omvs said:
Do people really have that many short power outages that a 60 second tide over would be worth it?
Click to expand...

Yes, and power fluctuations are also not good for the computer I think. I don't want my computer to be drawing power from a source whose voltage is changing randomly. Adding a small battery would barely add any weight, and weight hardly matters on a desktop computer.

Also, remember that the point of the iMac is to have a clutter-free setup. All of the iMac users I know are pretty crazy about having a sleek setup. Having an external battery is ugly and overkill.
 
You would want a different type of battery like a car style battery that was ok with being topped up ALL the time.

I don't think this happens enough to most people though.
 
It'll never happen. Additional cost, bulk and complexity. If you live somewhere with unreliable mains power you can simply buy a UPS (commonly available and cheap too) or a laptop and hook an external display and keyboard to it.
 
blueroom said:
It'll never happen. Additional cost, bulk and complexity. If you live somewhere with unreliable mains power you can simply buy a UPS (commonly available and cheap too) or a laptop and hook an external display and keyboard to it.
Click to expand...

Exactly, I just don't see it happening, ever.
 
omvs said:
A super-cheap UPS/powerstrip runs <$40, and would give you at least a 5 minute run time. I use an old APC XS 1500 for a more serious runtime, and it has pretty good over volt protection as well (my friend unfortunately had the opportunity to test it, and a lot of stuff not behind the UPC got fried).
Click to expand...

omvs but because of technology(AVR) used in modern power supply units you need to have UPS with pure sine output power. And I mean really, really pure. The purest sinus of all sinuses. I'm sure about it.
And because of that UPS with pure sinus are more expensive.
For example: http://www.amazon.de/CYBERPOWER-CP900EPFCLCD-Adaptive-Sinewave-Management-Software/dp/B004SO5FWM.
It costs 208 EUR.
What is more, when your computer power supply is using AVR (and I can guess that power unit in iMac is using it) UPS without pure sine isn't really protecting you. Sad but true.
 
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Or you could purchase a UPS?

Given your country they are not THAT expensive given the cost of a new iMac.:apple:
 
sainsburys said:
omvs but because of technology(AVR) used in modern power supply units you need to have UPS with pure sine output power. And I mean really, really pure. The purest sinus of all sinuses. I'm sure about it...
Click to expand...

Well, I've run my iMac off the APC that I mentioned a few times for long durations without any problems. I'm not sure how 'pure' the sine wave is but I could try scoping it if you were really curious -- just have to check and see if my scope can handle 120v.

I'm not a power supply specialist (digital/mixed signal EE), but seems to me the supply will happily convert anything not too crazy into to a decent DC that won't harm the machine. Even if some high frequency components made it through, I'd imagine the caps on the DC side will filter it out since they have to deal with wild fluctations on the current draw from the components due to cpu/gpu/etc activity.

OTOH, I could see an argument for those doing serious audio work -- maybe you could modulate the supply enough that it'd show up on the A2D / D2A's as a signal. But otherwise it just smells like a scam to separate folks and their $, like some audio cable manufacturers. :)

EDIT: doing a bit of google searching confirms my suspicions -- this thread seems informative: http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2095771
 
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