On Wed, 30 Jan 2002, Henry House wrote: > So I need a UPS. A little searching turned up: > > http://www.us.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=10234009&loc=494 > > which is described as "Ellipse 1200 RS232 free standing UPS 1200VA". It is > made by MGE. The price and specs look good, but I hope to hear a > recommendation or experience before I buy it. >
I'd be concerned about the very light size of this thing. Says the weight is 8.2 kg(18 lbs). There doesn't sound like there's going to be much battery reserve. I have an APC Smart-UPS 1400 VA here that weighs 24.1 kg(58lbs), and runs at 45% load, for 26 minutes. Was about 30 when we bought it a few years ago. Aside from transformer weights, there's probably over double the battery capacity in the APC compared to the Ellipse. It's like the APC 280 to 500 Back-UPS Pro series.. Same runtime at the same load, it uses the same battery inside, just a different firmware. Don't be fooled by VA ratings. Go find a standard load on whatever you're comparing, and see how long the actual run time is. I could make a 300VA unit, that will run for 6 weeks off a 9 volt battery that fits in your pocket. The only thing is, I'm going to plug an LED and resistor into the output. 6 week runtime! Not making a recommendation either way, just mentioning you might want to look into the "real" battery life. Just looked around a bit, the Puslar ESV+ at http://www.us.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=10032414&lock=494 looks a lot better to me. Sure you don't have the load capability of the 1200VA, but you have a lot more battery capacity. Myself, I like the APC units *shrug*. Management software works, with either the network card we have in this one, or the actual cable. Now to go back to trying to convince my supervisor of the merits of the Matrix 5000XL with 6 XL battery packs :) mike