It's possible that you don't have an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) in your mix of computing equipment and devices at your home office or remote school space.
A UPS is a box with a big battery in it and circuitry that regulates the power from your wall socket, providing a power buffer during power failures or brown outs.
While deploying my fourth unit, I documented the steps for potential users who might be interested in adding a unit to their workspace.
Over the years, the codename for the top of the line consumer APC UPS has changed. It's currently the tongue-twistingly named BX1500M-LM60, but the structure of the device hasn't changed much in the ten years since I bought my first unit.
The 1500M is the biggest consumer grade UPS that Schneider Electric offers under the APC brand, and it's a heavy unit.
Much of that weight is the result of a double battery system, two standard lead-acid batteries joined by a sled and held together by big adhesive labels.
The device ships with the batteries in backward, disconnected from the onboard system and you'll have to slide out a very tightly fitted bay door to get access to the battery bundle.
Once inserted, it's wisest to power it on, unconnected to a load, for 24 hours to ensure that the battery gets a full charge.
Since getting my first 1500va unit, I've never wavered in my commitment to setting aside cash to buy nearer the top of the line of these units.
The first UPS was set to provide protected power to a mission-critical workstation tower that pulls a truly absurd amount of power. It's the only thing plugged into the battery plugs of that unit and in an outage, gives me roughly 15 minutes of time to shut down the computer.
[caption id="attachment_923738" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Most of the weight of a UPS is the lead-acid battery that powers it. The BX1500M-LM60 doubles capacity by connecting two standard batteries with a connecting sled. - Photo by Mark Lyndersay[/caption]
These big power boxes give you abundant power ports: five that run off the battery, five that are surge protected, an ethernet network surge port (one in, one out), a coaxial cable surge port (ditto, for a cable modem).
Other useful features are a wiring fault indicator, which lights up to let you know that you need an electrician to look at your wiring and a monitoring port that you connect with a supplied cable to a USB port on your computer.
On Windows, you download APC's PowerChute software to configure the UPS, including automated shutdown times for extended outages.
The MacOS has the feature built into its energy saver system pane.
Once you've plugged everything in, you won't be spending much time dealing with the back of the unit, but be sure to plug it directly into a wall socket.
On the front panel of the unit, you'll find a useful set of indicators.
Take note of the battery charge, which should read full after a 24-hour charge and the load capacity, which gives you an idea of how much power will be pulled from the battery in a switch-over
