Choosing UPS
Where can you get help in choosing the one that’s right for you?
If you are in the market for UPS power protection – and this is the first time you have thought about it – trawling the internet for information can be frustrating and you could end up more confused than ever. It’s a big subject, and a specialist one.
UPS manufacturers are a great source of information but much of it is either technical (geared towards electrical engineers rather than end users) or biased towards a certain type of technology.
If you’ve already got a UPS installed, you’ll have a good idea (based on past experience) of what to look for when it comes to upgrading or replacing it. However, in the past few years the power protection industry has undergone an evolutionary process of change and development of UPS products, solutions and services, driven largely by the desire for greater energy efficiency and lower lifetime costs of UPS systems overall. Advances in technology and manufacturing have resulted in smaller, more powerful products with fewer component parts and which are more reliable and sophisticated than their forebears.
Which UPS should I choose and where can I go for objective information?
Sadly, there are few places you can get information like this for free. UPS specialist resellers and manufacturers are running businesses from which they need to make a profit and they usually either charge for consulting advice or give it for free if they can then sell you their products. You may not be at the stage where you are ready to choose your UPS manufacturer or their products so, what can you do?
As luck would have it, we’ve written a book: The Power Protection Guide – the design, installation and operation of uninterruptible power supplies, which was published in 2007. It’s available from Amazon, all good booksellers and our own estore. At 290 pages, it details all of the elements you need to think about in terms of UPS power protection – and although our publisher insists on a cover price of £28-95, it offers great value for money and may even save money for you in the long-term. Armed with knowledge, you will be in a better position to get what you need and negotiate a good price.
Covering such items as criticality, UPS topologies and designs, UPS sizing and selection, online UPS designs, building in UPS reliability and resilience, batteries and alternative UPS back up solutions, UPS and generators, UPS monitoring and remote control, UPS logistics and installation, UPS warranties, maintenance and service, the book provides a handy tool for anyone responsible for assuring the delivery of critical power supplies for the continuity of their business – whatever business that might be. We’ve purposely incorporated a detailed index to make it easy to reference and appended some useful forms and worked examples. It is illustrated throughout with clear diagrams, charts and graphs.
