# Let's talk UPS, Power Conditioners, etc - How to protect my workstation?



## eric_w (Dec 31, 2017)

I recently upgraded everything and built a new PC after my motherboard from my previous PC died on me.

Then then today, my motherboard on my (older) HP died on me. Couldn't care less about this decade old HP since it wasn't used for much, but still...

After further reading, I am wondering if my area gets brownouts or there are some issues with inconsistent electricity to my units. (I've been using just a simple surge protector for years.) I watched a video of someone talking about how their components would give out much quicker than most people's components, and that improved when they bought a UPS. Perhaps everything is fine where I live, but I think it's time for me to protect my pc workstation a little more, considering the money I've invested into it. I want my build to last as long as possible here.

What should I go with? A friend recommended looking into a Furman power conditioner to protect my pc/components. What about a UPS? Which would be a better investment? I'm mainly looking for clean, consistent electricity for my units to prevent components like my motherboard from dying prematurely on me and protecting me from brownouts and blackouts.

I also have reservations on UPS units after reading some reviews on amazon saying that their UPS caught fire. I hope those were part of a very small batch of defective units.

This is not really my field of expertise, so any ideas are appreciated!


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## elpedro (Dec 31, 2017)

My setup is surge protector-ups-power conditioner.I do believe the power conditioner improved my sound.


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## charlieclouser (Jan 1, 2018)

Power conditioners, surge protectors, sure.... but when it comes to UPS units there is a big difference (in both price and capabilities) between the typical $249 shoebox-looking units you find at Costco and Frys, and the much more expensive units that are referred to as "on-line" units. With an online unit, you are always running from the batteries. This means that the output power is completely isolated from the input power source, and is about as clean as it can be. With cheaper, non-online units, the unit's batteries are not in circuit until the moment that input power is interrupted. These type of units will keep your computers and other gear from shutting off when the input power drops, but while the power is on, they're not really doing much of anything. Most of these units will hopefully be conditioning the power and protecting against surges, but operating from an online unit is a whole other deal.

For a long time, when I was in New Orleans which had very sketchy power that seemed to go out whenever the wind blew, I was running my entire studio, including speakers, synths, outboard, etc. from four large APC online UPS units. Bloody heaven! All analog audio was quiet - no hum, no RF, no nothing. That's to be expected since the whole rig was completely electronically isolated from any dirt on the power input. But each unit was around $1k. And when it came time to replace the batteries, which were old-style lead-acid type, it cost a few hundred per UPS and shipping was expensive due to the weight. So... kind of a hassle. Back then I used one unit for the computers, one for the synths, one for the outboard, and one for the speakers. Worked great.

I brought the units with me to LA and used them until the batteries failed to hold a charge, and gradually rotated them out of service, and I haven't replaced them. Now I just plug right into the wall, and I haven't had any issues in 15 years - but Los Angeles power is far better than in New Orleans, and I'm not running anything other than Apple hardware - no custom-built PC slaves or anything like that. I still use one of my old UPS-1500va units that still has good batteries to power my guitar setup, so all the pedals, PODs, etc. run from that and it's dead silent on my analog lines - but I come out of that rig via AES, so it's only that cube full of guitar pedals and unbalanced lines that's powered in this manner. All the computers and stuff are just plugged into the wall.

I have been thinking about getting back on the UPS horse and the units I like these days are the APC Smart-UPS-RT - model number SURTA 1500xl which is about $900. The 1500 model number indicates 1500va capacity, which is about the biggest that you can plug into a normal 15a wall outlet, which is probably what you have on your wall unless you've made special arrangements. They do come in much larger capacities, but anything over 1500va or so will come with a connector that will NOT plug into your normal 10a/15a wall outlets and MUST NOT be "adapted" to do so. Price and technology in this area has not changed much in the last 20 years - the current APC 1500va unit is maybe $300 cheaper than the equivalent unit from 20 years ago. Lead-acid batteries are still what they use, and replacements are available even for ancient units. There are thousands of these things in service all over the globe, and there are even third-party companies that provide replacements and refurbish the batteries that APC units use.

APC is by far the market leader in this segment, and although there are many other brands that cater to areas like the home theater market, like CyberPower etc. (some of which are actually re-badged low-end APC gear) - APC absolutely rules this market space, from $149 baby units for little Skylar's gaming PC all the way to $20,000 units for server farms. Buy with confidence from APC.

A 1500va UPS will power a LOT of computer gear - perhaps everything in a modern DAW rig, except the speakers of course. If you have a bunch of slaves you might need more than one. There are a variety of online calculators to guesstimate how big of a UPS your rig will need. Here's the one that APC provide, which will give you some sort of a thumbnail view of how much juice your rigs might need:

http://www.apc.com/tools/ups_selector/pso/zones/by_device.cfm?location_type=home

If you're going to go into the range of 1000va - 1500va UPS units, please check your breaker panel and figure out exactly what outlets are wired to what breakers, and whether those breakers are rated at 10amp or 15amp. Lots of older houses just had a single 10amp breaker for all of the installed lighting and outlets in each room, but more modern houses may have 15amp breakers and / or multiple breakers within a single room. My house was built in 1995 and has two 15amp breakers for the outlets in the room I use for my studio - one breaker is for the outlets on the far wall and the overhead lights, and the other is for the outlets on the near wall. So I have to run a couple of burly 15amp extension cords to spread the load across the two breakers / circuits.

Unlike with online UPS units, it's always safe to use a more burly extension cord / power strip than you need, like using 15amp rated cords and power strips plugged into a 10amp circuit - so feel free to get nice fat 15amp extension cords - and they can be as long as you want with no issues. I've been using 50-foot 15amp cords for decades to spread the load to multiple circuits. No problems there. Just don't buy the super-cheapo ones. It's not like you'll be buying them by the dozen every week, and a one-time sting from buying four $40 cords isn't as bad as an electrical fire, is it? When it comes to plugging big fat online UPS units into lower-rated circuits, well... that's different, because a UPS actually acts like a load, like an appliance - drawing power to charge its batteries. Online type units may draw their full rated capacity at any time. See below:

If you try to run two 1500va UPS units from the two outlets in a single wall plate that is powered by a 10amp circuit breaker.... well, that's bad. To simplify by a LOT - at 120 volts, a single 10amp circuit will support a 1200va UPS unit and no more. A 15amp circuit will support a 1800va UPS unit and no more. If all the wall outlets in your room are connected to a single 10amp breaker, then 1200va is the limit for ALL of the outlets COMBINED. Here's an online calculator that may help:

https://www.rapidtables.com/calc/electric/va-to-amps-calculator.html

(choose Single-Phase and Line-to-Line volts of 120 if you're in a normal house in the USA)

If you're going to be operating in this range, either suss out COMPLETELY which outlets are connected to which breakers, and the ratings for everything... or call an electrician. When you're just plugging gear into power strips into the wall, then 500va worth of gear uses 500va of power, and only when it's on - but when you plug 500va worth of gear into a 1500va online-type UPS and plug THAT into the wall, well, that UPS will / can / may draw the FULL 1500va at some / all of the time - whenever the UPS is connected, even if the gear is turned off. I think that online type units act this way, while non-online units don't - but I may be totally talking out my ass since it's been 20+ years since I had that talk with the electricians.

I'm a little foggy on this stuff, but you definitely don't want to have big fat online-mode UPS units sucking hard on the in-wall wiring that's not up to the task. It's worth a bit of Google-ing and possibly a $300 house call from an electrician.

TL;DR - if you're going to spend for a UPS, might be a good idea to go the extra few hundred bucks and get one that's an "online" type for full isolation from the wall plug.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Jan 1, 2018)

Be careful with putting your speakers on a UPS or filter as it can limit the current and will affect how your speakers sound. Also, most "filters" for power which claim to clean up the power are useless. You'd need a refrigerator sized unit in order to actually filter the power down to 60Hz. There is a new technology being developed which does significantly improve the power (I've heard it for myself and have spent many hours with the unit) but it's not something I can talk about. I don't even know the name of the product or company making it. 

For protecting a computer, the average UPS should be fine but the more fancy ones like Charlie mentioned can provide better protection.


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## charlieclouser (Jan 1, 2018)

Yeah, the only reason I was running my speakers from a UPS in New Orleans was because the power would go out every single time it rained, which was...often. Plus, it was only a tiny Hafler amp driving NS-10's, so.... no biggie. 

We actually ran a 72-input SSL 4k and a pair of Studer analog 24-track machines on UPS systems, but they were these industrial Toshiba units that were as big as a mini-fridge, and I think there were seven of them maybe? Before we had them, when the power would go out it was a mad dash with flashlights to power off all of the buckets underneath the SSL and then run into the machine room and turn off about six switches on the SSL computer and power supply racks. If you didn't make it in time before the power came back on, inevitably something would break in the SSL, and that meant yet another plane ticket, car service, hotel room, and at least two day's pay for an SSL tech to fly down from Nashville - not to mention any parts that had to be replaced. So after about three of those incidents, the big-ass Toshiba units were installed. 

We also used similar units to keep the whole NIN backline powered up on tour - the whole venue could go down but all the samplers stayed loaded! 

Sometime during the install of those Toshiba units was when I first heard someone describe the difference between regular UPS units and those described as "online" - and although it's been 20+ years I still basically ignore any units that don't explicitly say that they are "true online" type.


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## Prockamanisc (Jan 1, 2018)

charlieclouser said:


> UPS in New Orleans was because the power would go out every single time it rained,


Haha, that's where I live, and thats why I got one. It's terrifying when the light start to dim and your project hasn't been saved in the last few minutes.


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## AllanH (Jan 1, 2018)

charlieclouser said:


> ... and the much more expensive units that are referred to as "on-line" units. With an online unit, you are always running from the batteries. T.



If there are any risk of brownouts, the "on-line" units are absolutely key. Some vendors call it double-conversion, as in AC->DC->AC. This means you're always running through the batteries. 

In addition to APC, I would look at Eaton. Eaton has a large data center business but is not well-known in the consumer market.


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## eric_w (Jan 1, 2018)

Thanks for the responses, guys, and the detailed explanation, Charlie.

I think I will start with getting an electrician out here.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Jan 1, 2018)

AllanH said:


> In addition to APC, I would look at Eaton. Eaton has a large data center business but is not well-known in the consumer market.



+1 for Eaton. I've only seen them installed in bigger studios.


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## charlieclouser (Jan 1, 2018)

Ooooh.... I like the look of some of those Eaton units. They seem about $100 cheaper than APC for a 1500va unit, and the per-outlet power consumption metering on the front panel is very slick. 

AllanH thanks for mentioning "double-conversion" - that's the term I couldn't put my finger on which is probably more accurate and widely used than "online" - which sounds like it's uploading your power consumption figures to your Tinder profile or something.


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## eric_w (Jan 2, 2018)

elpedro said:


> My setup is surge protector-ups-power conditioner.I do believe the power conditioner improved my sound.



I'm looking at the smart ups units and it says they also provide conditioning. Would there be any reason to add a Furman-type conditioner to the setup? A smart ups should cover most things for protection (aside from an on-line ups), yes?


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## elpedro (Jan 2, 2018)

eric_w said:


> I'm looking at the smart ups units and it says they also provide conditioning. Would there be any reason to add a Furman-type conditioner to the setup? A smart ups should cover most things for protection (aside from an on-line ups), yes?


i would think so.


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