[SOLVED] I'm looking for a good (cheap or as cheap as it can get) UPS meant for computers

[PrinceTexasLoaf]

Here's my power supply
My current UPS well when on battery power my psu makes awful noise, and the fans were messed up sounding pretty rough for about 5 mins after briefly being on UPS power. This's a replacement of my other PSU which I'm pretty sure my UPS killed..... Any recommendations on a solid UPS that'll provide clean power to my system and not kill my PSU? I'd prefer not spending $100 on a new PSU only for that one to get killed as well... I found this UPS which looks pretty good. But I'm wondering if it'd be overkill or not? My specs are Ryzen 5 2600 with an RX 580, one hdd, one ssd, 5 case fans and a 6w cpu fan, 2 sticks of ram. Just to give you an idea of power-consumption... I do plan on upgrading this pc in the future soo that's why I chose that one, but if anybody has any recommendations on what'd be better It'd be appreciated..

 

[BogdanH]

First, good UPS... you should look after well known brands (i.e. CyberPower or APC).
Cheap.. well, UPS is very long term buying (has even longer usage span than PSU, for example). And because of this reason, one should be ready to spend few bucks more: to have a quality & reliable power out of it.
I use APC, because here, it's cheaper than CyberPower... and I'm perfectly fine without "features" like LCD display and similar.
One is needed to be said.. battery life is in average 3-4 years. And so it will happen you'll spend more money on replacing batteries than on UPS itself. Do I even need to say don't buy cheap batteries?
How much power should your UPS have depends on your system (PC + monitor + modem + router + NAS + printer +...).

 

[jay32267]

I think it's too small.
That's a 650 watt PSU....which draws more than that at full load.
It probably draws over 800 watts at full load.
If you were only using at at half load...I think it would work fine.

 

[punkncat]

APC and others have calculators you can use to determine a recommended size. I suggest going a bit bigger for future needs.

 

[PrinceTexasLoaf]

okay so I found this one. What do you think of it? It's cheaper than the apc alternative by $10 and has 2 more ports, and a 3 year warranty that also covers the batteries.

 

[jay32267]

I think it satisfies the requirements and therefore obviously is a much better choice than the other one.

I can't comment on the quality as I'm not familiar with UPS manufacturers and quality but I see the reviews on Amazon are pretty good which is a good sign.

I did have a UPS melt on me once and almost cause a fire.

It wasn't the brand you are looking at.

If it were I might steer you away.

 

[punkncat]

Something else to consider here, if you have the room, are "A/V" backups.
I purchased an APC some years ago that is a rack mount unit, powers all the computers in the office along with one monitor each, and my switch....I have the modem on a separate one...and it works super well and was a bit less expensive than the "PC" devoted ones, at least at that time.

 

[Karadjgne]

Start reading. Seriously. Most upc have only partially dedicated battery ports, generally 2, the rest are nothing more than spike protected ports. Plug the pc into one of those ports and all you've got is a very expensive surge arrestor. Those ports are intended to protect non-essential items like printers and speakers and desk lamps etc. Only the monitor/pc needs battery backup.

So a cheaper upc has 2 more ports. Meaningless if it also does not have AVR, line-interactive, enough KVA to actually power the pc long enough to allow you to save your work and shutdown etc. You need to look at time under full load, time at half load, what's actually considered full loads etc.

Buying cheap and throwing out half the reasons to have a ups in the first place, just to save $10 and get 2 more useless outlets is... (not gonna say it out loud but is 2 words that starts with f and ends in pid).

If you need a ups for a reason, get the Right one, ah heck the price, your pc is a lot more valuable than the value of price differences. The first time lightning hits your house and the gpu smokes because you saved $10 on the ups and got one thats simply junk for your appication, or you loose everything on a storage drive from data corruption, you'll have no one else to blame. Then decide if that $10 saved was worth 20 years of the kids pictures and explain to the wife how you lost them.

Sorry, ranting. But the point stands. Choose a ups based on ability, not gimmicks, know what you are getting into. The CyberPower 1500 is a decent unit, has line interactive, AVR, and for your use, well over 10 minutes of runtime even under gaming loads. The 1350 would work as well.

 

[Deleted member 14196]

Good and cheap are mutually exclusive. Whenever power is considered for a computer don’t ever be a cheapo or you will regret it later