Author Topic: surge protection/battery back up  (Read 2010 times)

Offline balloonguy

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surge protection/battery back up
« on: January 12, 2022, 10:01:31 AM »
Sorry if this is in the wrong section.
What should I be looking for? I just checked amazon and there are 5 star ratings for $50.00 units and $250.00 units. I am looking at a large format printer and I would hate blow the computer because I bought the wrong surge protector...
Thanks-
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Offline mk162

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Re: surge protection/battery back up
« Reply #1 on: January 12, 2022, 10:06:58 AM »
surge protectors do almost nothing.  I've lost more stuff on protectors than I care to talk about.

A better bet is a surge suppressor with a battery backup built in. Supressors will switch to battery mode to deliver clean power in the event of low or over voltage on the line.  I would get the biggest unit you can afford.  Everything getting plugged into that machine needs to be protected though.

We just had a surge come through the coax and fry our modem and took out our firewall as well.  The coax was grounded, but we've now added another layer with a CAT5 grounding unit.  They are about $20 on amazon and it should just give us that little bit of extra protection.  You can never be too safe.  We literally just spent over $500 for new equipment because of a power surge.


Offline blue moon

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Re: surge protection/battery back up
« Reply #2 on: January 12, 2022, 03:31:34 PM »
get an APC or Cyber Power. Skip the rest.
I would probably get a 1500VA unit. Pretty much anything from those two in that size will work well for you. Look into features they offer (like the network or cable protection) and see which of those you might want.

We have them on every single piece of equipment. Some of the cheap ones are cheap, but the batteries will have to be changed every two years. $39 units on all the computers. $150 units on servers and workstations. I think we spent well over $500 on the one for the CTS.

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Offline Admiral

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Re: surge protection/battery back up
« Reply #3 on: January 12, 2022, 04:34:33 PM »
This is overkill and I wouldn't worry about it but if you do want 'the best' UPS system, look for 'pure sine wave', that will delivery cleaner power but it likely isn't needed at all since the printer actually uses DC power through an inverter.

APC and Cyber Power are the ones I use at work, usually 1500va, so I agree with blue moon.

Offline DonR

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Re: surge protection/battery back up
« Reply #4 on: January 12, 2022, 05:34:52 PM »
I have several of the Cyber Power 1500va. They work well and the batteries are easy to change out when they go bad.