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I’m hardly never home. Should I invest in a battery backup for my Mac? I get about 3 outages a year. Most of the time I’m not home to do a proper shutdown. Will the backup protect my Mac more than a surge protector?
iMac 21.5″, macOS 11.2
if you mean an ups Uninterruptible power supply - Wikipedia
then if you are not at home when the outage happens it will just delay it, when it runs out of battery power your mac will experience the outage, unless the ups has some software to shut down the computer nicely
surge protector are meant to protect your devices from power spikes like if a lightning strike nearby not if you have an outage
if you mean an ups Uninterruptible power supply - Wikipedia
then if you are not at home when the outage happens it will just delay it, when it runs out of battery power your mac will experience the outage, unless the ups has some software to shut down the computer nicely
surge protector are meant to protect your devices from power spikes like if a lightning strike nearby not if you have an outage
macOS provides a safe method for shutting down the iMac connected to a UPS. I have an APC UPS model that connects to my iMac via a USB port. The APC appears in the Energy Saver preference pane ->UPS->Shutdown options. There you can set options that include a timed shutdown, a shutdown when there a specified minutes remaining, or a shutdown when a specified percentage of the UPS capacity has been reached. It works perfectly well. macOS recognizes most of the name brand UPS models out there.
No, APC does not shut your computer down, macOS does. The APC merely reports its status to macOS via its USB connection. That status includes things like the charge level, how many minutes are left before it’s out of battery power, the percentage of charge left, etc. macOS then acts based upon your settings in the Energy Saver preference panel. I have mine set to orderly shut down my iMac when the charge minutes left is down to 10 minutes. You first need to figure out how much power (watts) your system draws, then decide how long you want the system to last on battery backup (how long do outages typically last in your area), then select a model that meets those requirements. Well, and then there’s the budget considerations. The more power and longer battery time cost more money as the numbers go up.
As for which brands work with macOS you will need to check the manufacture’s specifications but most do if they have a USB port believe.
p.s. I also test the system occasionally to make sure it’s working. I pull the plug on the, UPS, observe that it goes into backup and then sit back and wait for the power to drain and observe that macOS shuts down my iMac correctly.
Thanks for your help.
So the APC UPS shuts the computer down for you? If so do all brands do this?
Why not just turn off the Mac when you are not home?
My elderly mother uses it.
do i need a battery backup for my iMac?
