Power supply and UPS, Can you help please?

I am very lucky because I have been able to save up for a new pc for the last 2 years and it arrived 2 weeks ago.

I'm lucky because it has the following:

Intel Core 2 Quadro Extreme QX6700 2.66GHz Quad Core overclocked to 3.0GHz
Asus Striker nForce 680 Deluxe Motherboard LGA775
Corsair XMS2-8500 C5 Dominator TwinX PC2-8500 4GB
Asus Geforce 8800 GTX 768MB PCIe
Western Digital Raptor 150GB 16MB Cache SATA
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 750GB 16MB Cache SATA-II
NEC AD7173A 18x DL DVD±RW
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Music

This requires an Enermax Galaxy 850W EGA850EWL Modular PSU.

I know that at home the power supply is very prone to Surges and Brownouts. I have already had one hard drive wrecked in a previous PC some years ago.

So I would like to protect my investment but don't have enough technical knowledge.

I am looking for a UPS and I believe it needs to have an output of at least 1500va...is that right or could I get away with something lower? The technical literature that came with the Enermax PSU also says the UPS must supply the PSU in Sine Wave type not Simulate Sine Wave.

With all that in mind I have looked at the usual Belkin and APC products but they don't seem to do the job. The only one that does is the Alberex 1500va Sinewave Line Interactive UPS. This is where I loose the will to live ! Can anyone advise if this is correct or have I choosen a UPS that will power a small town !

Thanks for your patience and I look forward to some advice.

I don't know about all this sine wave stuff, but the business market APC UPS's are excellent. And one would imagine you would want your server to be on the best kind of UPS.

The APC R1500 and SmartUPS series (ie SmartUPS 1500) are both decent UPS's. I think either would be great, and not excessively expensive.

You might need to look at Insight (www.insight.com) to get the right product codes, and then go searching the web for cheaper.

The UPS just needs to supply your PSU with the same source voltage, in the UK that's 220Vac@50Hz. Or you could save yourself money and just get a surge protecting power strip, the worst a brownout will do is trash your filesystem.

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Originally Posted by aidanjt

The UPS just needs to supply your PSU with the same source voltage, in the UK that's 220Vac@50Hz. Or you could save yourself money and just get a surge protecting power strip, the worst a brownout will do is trash your filesystem.

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You are correct in saying it has to be a minimum of 220V, but in the UK, it's actually 230V±10V so 220-240V is the required operating voltage.

There two types of UPS, the true UPS and the battery by-pass type.

A true UPS feeds the connected devices from a battery or capacitors all the time. In the event of a power-loss or fluctuation all that happens is the battery ceases to charge and the PC eventually discharges it completely (hopefully shutting down in a controlled way before that happens).

The battery by-pass UPS systems take advantage of the fact that most PSU's have some residual current in them at all times and they don't supply the PC off the battery all the time, they by-pass it normally and when the power drops or fluctuates, power is transferred to the battery or capacitors so the PC keeps running.

By saying what they are saying in their recommendations, Enermax are warning you they don't guarantee their PSU will work with the battery by-pass type of UPS if it's under heavy load.

APC make very good true UPS units and I would suggest you look at something like the APC Smart-UPS which will keep your PC and TFT up long enough to shut it down cleanly (about 2 minutes) and the supplied software will make the shut-down happen as rapidly as possible.

If you really do have fluctuating power, then it's worth spending £300 or £400 having an electrician fit surge protection at the main distribution panel, but that will only prevent surges damaging your equipment, not power dips/brownouts. To combat brownouts and power failures you need a true UPS, and that's not going to be cheap unfortunately.

Many thanks for your help.