Author Topic: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?  (Read 5965 times)

Offline Chalenge

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UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« on: October 16, 2008, 11:50:48 PM »
I just bought a completely new setup as I posted two weeks ago. The motherboard arrived DOA so I am not able to start building it right away (RMAd it). Then two days ago my two year old UPS (APC Back-UPS XS 1000) started signalling 'REPLACE BATTERY' so I began considering that I DID over tax the circuits but I am having trouble researching a replacement.

I have a total of 617 Watts running on a 850 Watt PSU (Kingwin Mach 1 800W) and the XS 1000 was rated to 600W only.  :frown:

My new system has a APC Smart-UPS SUA1500 1440VA 980W UPS which is great but is it going to be enough? My new PSU is 1220W! Then also I have been warned away from using a UPS that is 'stepped square wave AC' and to get a 'sine wave AC' unit? How do I know what the new APC unit is (stepped square or sine) or why does it matter?

Should I use the new UPS for my current system and get something even bigger still for the new system?

Kingwin says the PSUs require inputs that are 'Sine wave modified sine wave or square wave?' yet the Mach 1s are all 'Full Range PFCs' (doesnt that mean they require Sine wave)?
« Last Edit: October 16, 2008, 11:59:46 PM by Chalenge »
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Offline Fulmar

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #1 on: October 17, 2008, 12:35:26 AM »
Couple of questions first.  What are you new system specs.  Do you really need a 1KW+ PSU?  Is this like a dual/triple SLI system?  If your new system does reach close to your peak PSU rating of 1220W (if this is the true non-fudged PSU rating, manufacturers like to fudge with this number sometimes) I would be incredibly impressed.  And if you're reaching your max output of your PSU (somehow) you'd more than likely begin experiencing power related problems on your system.

Issue #1:  Are you still planning on replacing your XS1000's batteries?  I'm familiar with this unit and they sometimes can be a pain to replace (at least for the first time).  If you are going to replace them, the unit takes 2 x 12V 7Ah (Ah rating may be higher - i.e. 7.5, 8) that are stack on stop of each other hooked in series with a large cable coming off the two.  I've replaced countless batteries in these units during my college days working at Batteries Plus.  The batteries in the unit would look like these:
http://www.batteriesplus.com/p-32634-werker-12v-75ah-agm-battery-with-187-terminal.aspx

If you are going to replace these, let me know because I can walk your through it.

Issue #2:  The APC SUA1500 is a nice beefy UPS.  I have the older APC 1400 which I run my current system off of.  My computer (C2D E6400 at 2.66, 4gb ddr2, 3 hd's, 8800 640mb, other stuff) on idle in Windows uses about 200W (I have a Kill-A-Watt to measure wattage - search NewEgg).  During a high end game with 75% cpu usage on both cores the system tops out about 270W.  My tower in the only thing I plug into my APC 1400.  I put my 20" and 17" monitors plugged into a smaller Belkin 700VA unit so that in the event of a power outage I can get the maximum up time on my system.  But I'm getting side tracked.

I'd need to know your system specs, but my guess is that the APC 1500 would easily handle your system and your monitor(s).  My 20" uses about 80W and my 17" uses about 65W.  Even if your system used 750 watts and your monitors used 100W, you'd still be good.  Your APC unit has a load meter on it that will tell you how much is on the system.  My APC 1400 with my current computer uses 1/5 bars.  I've plugged in my P4 system running on the same UPS and reached 2/5.  And the only time I have ever reached 5/5 bars and a warning beep was when I accidently plugged a power strip with my laser printer into the UPS.  Laser printers when printing or starting up use a lot of juice.  My little $100 b/w one uses 700-800W when starting/printing.  So I came close to maxing out my UPS when I had my computer on.

Issue #3: Off the top of my head and w/o Googling, I have no idea about the sine wave stuff.
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Offline Fulmar

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #2 on: October 17, 2008, 12:49:35 AM »
On a side note, I have never tested the run time on my APC 1400 for more than 30 seconds.  And my current batteries are going on about 2 1/2 years and I should really check their health.  It's also a good tip to physically check the batteries (open up the case) every 6 months or so.  I'd say 25% of the time when I was replacing bad batteries in UPS systems at Batteries Plus, the SLA/AGM batteries would become bloated in their old/bad age.  See this image to see what I'm talking about:
http://www.lextec.com/images/bt_dead_battery_lg.jpg

When this happens, it can be a B$%^#! to get the batteries out.  Sometimes we had to completely disassemble the casing and sometimes we physically couldn't get them out.

Also, on the XS1000's batteries, Batteries Plus runs about $33 a battery so it'd be $70+ after tax to get that UPS up and running again.  Depending on where you live, you can find places that don't jack you on the price.  You may be able to find it locally for $20 a battery or so.  Online retailers will sell it to you cheap, but those batteries weigh about 6lbs a piece and your savings will be lost in S/H.  Quality is always a concern too.  APC's OEM batteries are very good and some of the best.  Powersonic and B&B are also good brands.  Batteries Plus's Werker line wasn't too bad.  I'd avoid the no name stuff. 
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Offline Chalenge

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #3 on: October 17, 2008, 01:07:06 AM »
Fulmar I think you already saw this but... Aside from the UPS I already listed I will be using:

Intel Core 2 Extreme QX9770 Yorkfield 3.2GHz 12MB
RiDATA NSSD-S25-64-C04MPN 2.5" 64GB SATA II 3.0Gb Internal Solid state disk (x4)
Seagate Barracuda ES.2 ST3500320NS 500GB 7200 RPM 32MB (x4)
HT OMEGA CLARO Plus+ 7.1 Channels 24-bit 192KHz
LG Black 6X BD-R 2X BD-RE 16X DVD+R 6X Blu-ray DVD-ROM 4MB Cache SATA Internal Blu-ray Burner (x2)
DIAMOND 4870X2PE52G Radeon HD 4870 X2 2GB 512-bit (x2)
KINGWIN Mach 1 ABT-1220MA1S 1220W ATX / BTX CrossFire
Thermaltake CL-P0257 Blue orb
Hanns·G HG-281DPB Black 28" 3ms Widescreen LCD HDMI (x3)
Matrox Triplehead 2 Go (digital)
Adaptec 2252400-R 8-lane PCI-E SATA / SAS RAID

I also ordered a APC Back-UPS RS 1500 intended for the monitors only but its not here yet.

Adding up all the devices I get a total of about 840W (more with the monitors but they will be on separate UPS) so I dont think I will exceed 1220W. Im pretty sure I can trust Kingwin to be the PSU it says it is.  :aok

Are you saying the electronics on this old UPS is probably okay and a battery change would be okay?

Also the power requirements will only go up because I am building a pit to fly from that uses USB gauges. At minimum I believe fourteen gauges will be required (not sure of USB load there).
« Last Edit: October 17, 2008, 01:14:47 AM by Chalenge »
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Offline RTHolmes

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #4 on: October 17, 2008, 03:48:44 AM »
AFAIK all APCs output sine wave.

coupla things:

why on earth would you want to spend money on a UPS for monitors? :huh surge protection is all you need. ($10?)

1220W PSU? people tend to massively overspec PSUs anyway but this is nuts.

Ive run a SUA1500 for a few years, batteries finally needed replacing so I did. still gave errors and wouldn't charge - turns out the UPS itself has given up (I know its probably just a cap gone but dont have time to fix myself) so now I have the rack version. It has a HP ML380, DL360, 3x 24pt 1GB Netgear smart switches, ADSL/ISDN router, wireless access point and 2 analogue modems running off it. The servers run for 5 mins before shutdown scripts launch, leaving the rest of the network stuff running for a couple of hours on charge (so I can VPN in and diagnose any problems.)

point is - only put the stuff you need on the UPS (ie. just stuff with a HD inside) the rest of it just needs surge protection.
« Last Edit: October 17, 2008, 03:51:57 AM by RTHolmes »
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Offline Fulmar

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #5 on: October 17, 2008, 10:01:13 AM »
I plug the monitors into the UPS because when the power goes out and I'm on the computer, I'd like to be able to see what I'm doing on the computer.  Yeah you could be using PowerChute to shut it down for you, but what if I need to pull something off the computer when I still have no power.
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Offline Fulmar

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #6 on: October 17, 2008, 10:21:10 AM »
Using this calculator to try and give a better look on your power consumption.
http://extreme.outervision.com/psucalculatorlite.jsp

I calculated the Q9650 because the X9770 isn't on their site yet.  Shouldn't make a difference.  I put 4 dimms of DDR2*.  4870 in crossfire, 4 SATA HDDs, 4 SSDs, 4 USB devices*, 3 120 LED fans*, and a high end desktop motherboard.

It calculated out 675 watts for this system, which should be the upper region of what the power consumption would be if everything on your computer was running at 100% (video card, cpu, etc).  Granted again, this is kind of an estimate.  Now this was w/o the 3x 28" monitors which I would imagine would get close to 300W combined and I'd recommend using a 2nd UPS for these.  My opinion is that the APC 1500 should do a fine job and easily handle your system without the 3 monitors plugged into it.

As for the older XS1000, as long as the unit said "Replace Batteries," it should be okay yet, unless it got damaged by lightning or something.  I can't say this for sure.  I've replaced hundreds of UPS batteries before and sometimes you'll get a unit that even after you replace the batteries it would still continue to say "replace batteries."  Then its obvious that something is wrong with that UPS.  I'd say that would happen on 1 in 30 UPS's and it was more frequent on older units (10+ years old).  And to the best of my memory, it happened more on non-APC brand UPS's.  Like old Compaqs and Tripp-Lite systems.  So I'd recommend buying locally so you can easily return the batteries if the unit is bad.  Otherwise you have the hassle of shipping them back.
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Offline Chalenge

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #7 on: October 17, 2008, 12:12:58 PM »
AFAIK all APCs output sine wave.

coupla things:

why on earth would you want to spend money on a UPS for monitors? :huh surge protection is all you need. ($10?)

1220W PSU? people tend to massively overspec PSUs anyway but this is nuts.

That would be a bad assumption concerning output as when I checked into it there are many APC units (workstation) that use 'stepped approximation of sine wave' which is saying 'stepped square wave.' The 'Network and Server' UPSs are mostly sinewave. You put monitors on a UPS when you want to be able to shut down programs that may be  spread across three monitors and dont want to lose your work.

I learned a long time ago that approaching the maximum useable power output of a PSU exposes your critical devices (hard drives) to power inefficiencies and failures. When I applied a rule of never exceeding 70% of a PSUs deliverable wattage I got more life out of my devices and seldom see abrupt failures unlike the days when I pushed the limits. This PSU is going to be supplying just what I estimated (Fulmar forgot to include two DVDs five fans and six additional USB devices and I believe the second 4870x2). My custom pit will use a powered hub so no need to include that except for the single line in.

Fulmar I would like your insight into changing batteries because I found a store not four miles from here that has them in stock.
« Last Edit: October 17, 2008, 12:16:13 PM by Chalenge »
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Offline RTHolmes

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #8 on: October 17, 2008, 01:24:22 PM »
interesting - I never realised they do a consumer range too.

I guess how much stuff you want on the UPS is very usage dependent, I developed a habit years ago of saving work whenever Ive completed even a little (using Mac Sytems 6-7 would do that for ya ;)) so a client box going down only costs me 10mins work (enough to be able to jot down on a pad while its fresh) plus I use a laptop alot. Ive beaten my users into the habit too, and a large % of our work is with server apps anyway - which is why only the servers get backups and UPS, everything else just gets surge protection.

my approach has always been just enough juice to let the important boxes shutdown gracefully, if you want to be able to carry on working for any length of time its an muuuch larger investment. backup genny for the pit maybe? :D
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Offline Chalenge

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #9 on: October 17, 2008, 02:00:55 PM »
The problem is (as I have run into previously) that 'disruptive shutdowns' can cause damage to entire folders of data even the autosave folders particularly if a program is in the act of saving at the time. My autosave is set for every 10 minutes but big deal if the folder gets churned like a ceasar salad! Vista seems better to me on this problem but thats just because I havent had a really bad failure yet.
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Offline Fulmar

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #10 on: October 17, 2008, 02:33:52 PM »
K, I'll put together a tutorial on it.  Gonna look for some pictures and will post when I got it ready.

EDIT:

Okay, since I don't have the physical UPS in front of me, I can't remember exactly how to take the cover off, but I believe there are 6-8 screws in the back of the unit (where the plugs are) that come out and the cover should come off.  If I'm wrong on this, let me know it's bet a couple years.

When you're buying the batteries, it's best to get the ones with the .250" spade connectors on them since the original wiring harness is for .250".  These are also called F2.  The smaller .187" will work but not quite as snug of a fit (also called the F or F1).

Once you get the original unit's batteries out, they should look like this (in the pic, the batteries are partially separated):


The batteries are stacked vertical and the light gray separate is lightly tape/glued to each battery.  You'll need to split/separate the batteries.  If the wiring on the batteries comes undone, it's okay as I'll explain the wiring.

So once you get the batteries separated, its best to note how the wires wrap around that light gray separator as it makes it a lot easily when stack the replacement batteries again (as in, the wires will fit nice and snug and the batteries attach nicely again).  You can disconnect all the wires and separate the old batteries.  A needle nose can come in handy as it can be a b*tch to unhook the wires sometimes.  Below is a diagram of how the batteries are wired together.  It does not include that light gray separator in the drawing, but you'll need to use that to stack the batteries.  See the above picture on how the wires feed through it.



The key thing to remember here is these batteries are hooked in series.  2 12V batteries in series = 24V.  2 batteries in series means that only one wire directly connects the batteries together (fat yellow wire) and it goes from Battery #1 Postive to Battery #2 Negative or vice versa.  Battery #1 will then have the negative wire (fat black one) attached to its Negative post and Battery #2 will have the positive wire (fat red) and the small yellow wire attached to the Positive post.

Since we broke the glue on the gray separator, I like to use nylon tape or packing tape to wrap around the two batteries.  Nothing heavy duty, just to keep them together when placing it back in the UPS.  This battery pack design is one of the poorest that APC every made and it may take you a bit to get all the wires fitting through that gray separator.

Depending on where you are getting your batteries from, they may install them for you.  Batteries Plus will, but depending on the store (they are franchises) they may charge you for it, so I can't say.  At my store we never charged extra, even if it took 1/2 hour or the batteries swelled up.  If you do go to Batteries Plus, the part number for the batteries and the .250 connector is the SLAA12-7.5F2 (or the WKA12-7.5F2).  I'd hang on to the receipt and attach it to the unit/batteries since they come with a 1 year warranty.
« Last Edit: October 17, 2008, 03:26:18 PM by Fulmar »
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Offline RTHolmes

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #11 on: October 17, 2008, 04:19:34 PM »
The problem is (as I have run into previously) that 'disruptive shutdowns' can cause damage to entire folders of data even the autosave folders particularly if a program is in the act of saving at the time.

very true - which is why I dont run autosaves or backups on client boxes, every write is a chance for corruption. Ctrl-S is your friend :D


Fulmar I've got the problem you mentioned earlier - an SUA1500 with a new battery that still wont charge - any ideas? (this topic has made me realise we should have our pbx on a UPS too :uhoh)
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Offline Fulmar

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #12 on: October 17, 2008, 04:33:22 PM »
Fulmar I've got the problem you mentioned earlier - an SUA1500 with a new battery that still wont charge - any ideas? (this topic has made me realise we should have our pbx on a UPS too :uhoh)
In the SUA1500's there is a fuse that connects both 12V batteries together.  Sorry this is a small pic but the fuse is the blue thing connector the two batteries together on the left of the image.


Unscrew the bolts from the fust and check to make sure the fuse isn't blown.  If the fuse is good, check to make sure the new batteries are good too.  If you have a volt meter, check the voltage of each individual battery.  A 12V SLA battery reads about 10 volts if has about 1-5% charge in it.  If the voltage is below 10V, it could be a faulty battery.  A fully charged 12V SLA battery reads about 12.7-12.8 volts, if you get this reading, your UPS may be actually charging the batteries.

*Note this volt meter test only checks the state of charge and can only tell if a battery is bad if the voltage is drastically low.

If you don't have a volt meter, shake the battery, if it rattles (not the nuts/bolts rattling), its a sure sign the SLA battery is dead.  When this happens, sediments break off the lead plates inside the battery.
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Offline Chalenge

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #13 on: October 17, 2008, 07:19:00 PM »
Word from APC was pretty clear. When using a PFC type PSU it is highly recommended that you use a true sinewave UPS. The potential is that during the switch from wall power to battery the PFC PSU may shutdown if the switch over is not fast enough. A simulated sinewave (stepped sinewave) may not always be a problem or it may not always work.

Since I have seen this firsthand (and now I understand why) I will be upgrading to a true sinewave UPS.
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Offline Fulmar

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Re: UPS issues - HELP! (stepped square wave versus sine wave)?
« Reply #14 on: October 17, 2008, 09:25:08 PM »
Is the SUA1500 a true sinewave UPS?
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Aces High Movies available at www.derstuhl.net/ahmd2 - no longer aceshighmovies.com - not updated either