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hanggliding Author

Level 1

5 points

APC Smart-UPS 1500VA Best UPS for the money?

My latest choice for a UPS for my MacPro is:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=12372 71&CatId=234

Tiger has it for $299.00 + shipping which would meet my budget. Here are my questions:

1. Will it have trouble when my Mac Pro wakes from sleep under battery power?

2. I think it has AVR, AVR Trim & AVR Boost. Can anyone confirm this?

3. Is AVR, AVR trim & AVR boost the same as voltage conditioning and line conditioning?

4. I will be using a Brickwall surge protector at the wall first and then the UPS. Does anyone see any trouble with this set up?

My sytem is below and I will have a 20inch Apple Cinema. No other units.

Mac Pro, Mac OS X (10.5.1), 2-3.0GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon,4GB, (2) 500GB internal drives, NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 256MB, 20" Apple Cinema,Two 16x SuperDrives,FCP Studio

Posted on Dec 3, 2007 11:46 PM

21 replies

bartcatz

Level 1

0 points

Dec 5, 2007 10:30 AM in response to hanggliding

Dude, you don't have to convince the internet of your plans. Just do it if you think it is the rational approach.

Dec 5, 2007 11:01 AM in response to hanggliding

I used an APC Back-UPS ES 750 with my PowerMac G5 for 6 months or so, and it worked just fine. For $79 or so, you cannot beat it.

After six months, I considered how much I had invested in my G5 (8 GB of RAM, dual 250 GB internal drives, an ATI Radeon X800 XT graphics card, a Sonnet eSATA card and two external eSATA drives) plus the monitor (a not-so-cheap Samsung 21").

Even though the Back-UPS worked okay, considering the investment, I decided that better power protection might make sense. So I upgraded to an APC Smart-UPS XL 1000. While not cheap (close to $500), it is more likely to protect your investment.

p.s. The "XL" version of the Smart-UPS allows you to daisy-chain one or more external battery packs, while the non-XL version does not. Also, the Smart-UPS XL 1000 contains the same battery -- and provides the same run-time -- as the top-of-the-line Smart-UPS 1500. The only difference is in peak load handling, but the XL 1000 has ample headroom for a loaded Mac Pro -- or PowerMac G5 -- system.

I bought mine at Amazon.com, though it might be cheaper elsewhere:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00006BBKB

hanggliding Author

Level 1

5 points

Dec 5, 2007 9:48 PM in response to hanggliding

The APC Smart-UPS 1500VA is probably the best UPS for the money to protect my Mac Pro. It should also help protect the electronics using the Trim and Boost AVR sytem which in theory will help to make the Mac Pro last longer with less hardware and software issues from bad power. Having an APC Smart-UPS XL 1500VA would allow adding extra batteries for more runtime if needed.

hanggliding Author

Level 1

5 points

Dec 6, 2007 9:56 PM in response to hanggliding

Got my APC Smart UPS 1500VA today along with my Mac Pro. It was like Christmas early. I charged up the unit and have it working now without and USB support. I will work on that tomorrow and will probably use the native OS X support for UPS. I really think that will meet the needs for me personally.

I've done the tests with a fully charge unit. When the MP wakes up, it seems to have no problem at all. I don't even think the green lights showed half power at the time of waking.

My conclusions are:

1. The unit is probably more than I needed.
2. I don't think I have a MP that has an issue with excessive insurge currents
3. having an Smart XL unit would be nice if I had to work excessively during a power outage. But I now have an excuse to take a break.
4. Unless something changes, I consider this project finished for me and hope someone got at least a thing or two from this tread.

rt2

Level 1

110 points

Dec 30, 2007 9:35 AM in response to hanggliding

2 questions on the UPS:

1. Can the computer still safely sleep and awaken when connected to the UPS?

2. Since I use Bootcamp for CAD, would I install the the UPS software on on the XP OS?

The hatter

Level 9

61,001 points

Dec 30, 2007 9:59 AM in response to rt2

Go to APC and register to download PowerChute which works just fine for Windows.

APC Smart-UPS 1500VA Best UPS for the money?