On the topic of UPS and power conditioning

Let me start by saying I know a little about electronics from back in the
day when I used to repair computers, mostly commodore 64's at the chip level
but, not enough to always understand the interaction that every component
has on every other. Another words just enough to be dangerous.
In my former job I used to maintain, among other things, large UPS systems -
mostly rectifier units that converted 3-phase 230 to up to 300 amps of 54
volts DC and stored it in a rack of car battery sized deep cycle batteries
(4 to 48 batteries) and had another Inverter unit to produce 110vac from the
battery bank. I have seen the substation next to our building take a
lightning hit and knock out the whole area. The inverter started to hum
louder and our phone system and computer server room kept running with out
even a hiccup. To me this kind of setup seems very logical. And, one would
think that by doing this you can bring the power right down to clean DC and
then reproduce a clean synthetic sine wave at the output side totally
independent of what is going on at the input side. Rather than messing
around with power factor circuits and capacitor based brown-out circuits and
MOV's and L/C filters, etc. like Monster, Panasonic, etc. does. Why doesn't
someone just make a small all-in-one unit like big ones I've seen. Wouldn't
that make more sense? I would also think that it would cost less then the
horrific prices that monster charges for there way overpriced crap. I don't
know much about the rectifier units but the inverters were rather simple - a
second year electronics student could design one from the ground up.

On Tue, 4 Jul 2006 01:01:26 -0700, Redneck wrote:
(snip) Rather than messing
around with power factor circuits and capacitor based brown-out circuits and
MOV's and L/C filters, etc. like Monster, Panasonic, etc. does. Why doesn't
someone just make a small all-in-one unit like big ones I've seen. Wouldn't
that make more sense? I would also think that it would cost less then the
horrific prices that monster charges for there way overpriced crap. I don't
know much about the rectifier units but the inverters were rather simple - a
second year electronics student could design one from the ground up.

If you have properly designed electronic equipment with regulated power
supply and capacitors for constant voltage to its own circuits, why do you
need a power conditioner (overkill)? But if you want to watch TV after
the power goes out, there are UPS's of all different sizes to much larger
than you would need for video and sound system. You can even get whole
house inverters, like people with solor or wind power might use. It just
depends upon how addicted you are to TV and how much you are willing to
pay to watch TV during the rare times that your neighbors can't.

On Tue, 04 Jul 2006 01:01:26 -0700, Redneck wrote:

I don't know much about the rectifier units but the inverters were
rather simple - a second year electronics student could design one from
the ground up.

A rectifier is little more than 4 diodes. By comparison, an inverter is
complicated. Any decent UPS already does what you are talking about. The
only exception I can think of is the APC Back-Ups units, which do not.
They simply switch from line source during normal operation to regulated
AC during power failure.

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"David Efflandt" wrote

... It just
depends upon how addicted you are to TV and how much you are willing to
pay to watch TV during the rare times that your neighbors can't.

There's more to it than that. Those of us who live in areas with unreliable
electrical delivery during bad weather can make really good use of a UPS. A
couple of mornings ago there were several brief outages and brownouts within
a few hours, and my HT sailed through. Aside from improper shutdown/cooling
sequence for my HDTV lamp, my satellite receiver used to lock up regularly,
and now never does.

What you are suggesting, objohn, is exactly what a UPS intended for home
computers and electronics does on a smaller scale. I have two UPS units both
mfd by APC that convert AC to DC to keep a battery charged, with the DC
output of the battery then inverted to 115vac that continuously supplies AC
to the load, regardless of the good or bad condition of the input at the
wall. The only determining factor in selecting the UPS is the needed VA
rating. That should be determined by the electronic load whether a pc or
home theater system. The higher the UPS VA rating, the longer your system
will operate with 0 power at the wall. I'd suggest going to the APC website
to see what's available for your particular load. If in doubt, I'm sure that
they'd be more than pleased to suggest what's best for your system, rather
than relying upon a retail store's sales person.

"Redneck" wrote in message
...
Let me start by saying I know a little about electronics from back in the
day when I used to repair computers, mostly commodore 64's at the chip
level but, not enough to always understand the interaction that every
component has on every other. Another words just enough to be dangerous.
In my former job I used to maintain, among other things, large UPS
systems - mostly rectifier units that converted 3-phase 230 to up to 300
amps of 54 volts DC and stored it in a rack of car battery sized deep
cycle batteries (4 to 48 batteries) and had another Inverter unit to
produce 110vac from the battery bank. I have seen the substation next to
our building take a lightning hit and knock out the whole area. The
inverter started to hum louder and our phone system and computer server
room kept running with out even a hiccup. To me this kind of setup seems
very logical. And, one would think that by doing this you can bring the
power right down to clean DC and then reproduce a clean synthetic sine
wave at the output side totally independent of what is going on at the
input side. Rather than messing around with power factor circuits and
capacitor based brown-out circuits and MOV's and L/C filters, etc. like
Monster, Panasonic, etc. does. Why doesn't someone just make a small
all-in-one unit like big ones I've seen. Wouldn't that make more sense? I
would also think that it would cost less then the horrific prices that
monster charges for there way overpriced crap. I don't know much about the
rectifier units but the inverters were rather simple - a second year
electronics student could design one from the ground up.

"Redneck" wrote in message
...
Let me start by saying I know a little about electronics from back in the
day when I used to repair computers, mostly commodore 64's at the chip
level but, not enough to always understand the interaction that every
component has on every other. Another words just enough to be dangerous.
In my former job I used to maintain, among other things, large UPS
systems - mostly rectifier units that converted 3-phase 230 to up to 300
amps of 54 volts DC and stored it in a rack of car battery sized deep
cycle batteries (4 to 48 batteries) and had another Inverter unit to
produce 110vac from the battery bank. I have seen the substation next to
our building take a lightning hit and knock out the whole area. The
inverter started to hum louder and our phone system and computer server
room kept running with out even a hiccup. To me this kind of setup seems
very logical. And, one would think that by doing this you can bring the
power right down to clean DC and then reproduce a clean synthetic sine
wave at the output side totally independent of what is going on at the
input side. Rather than messing around with power factor circuits and
capacitor based brown-out circuits and MOV's and L/C filters, etc. like
Monster, Panasonic, etc. does. Why doesn't someone just make a small
all-in-one unit like big ones I've seen. Wouldn't that make more sense? I
would also think that it would cost less then the horrific prices that
monster charges for there way overpriced crap. I don't know much about the
rectifier units but the inverters were rather simple - a second year
electronics student could design one from the ground up.

Perhaps I need a little education, but why is a UPS, uninterruptible power
supply needed for an entertainment system? Are they susceptible to damage if
the power is interrupted? I can see that for surges. The key reason for a
UPS on a pc is, because it is interactive, data may be lost or files
corrupted. Even a UPS with minimal capacity will allow for an orderly shut
down, either automatically or manually, or in the case of brief
interruptions, to continue working.

"Redneck" wrote in message
...
Let me start by saying I know a little about electronics from back in the
day when I used to repair computers, mostly commodore 64's at the chip
level but, not enough to always understand the interaction that every
component has on every other. Another words just enough to be dangerous.
In my former job I used to maintain, among other things, large UPS
systems - mostly rectifier units that converted 3-phase 230 to up to 300
amps of 54 volts DC and stored it in a rack of car battery sized deep
cycle batteries (4 to 48 batteries) and had another Inverter unit to
produce 110vac from the battery bank. I have seen the substation next to
our building take a lightning hit and knock out the whole area. The
inverter started to hum louder and our phone system and computer server
room kept running with out even a hiccup. To me this kind of setup seems
very logical. And, one would think that by doing this you can bring the
power right down to clean DC and then reproduce a clean synthetic sine
wave at the output side totally independent of what is going on at the
input side. Rather than messing around with power factor circuits and
capacitor based brown-out circuits and MOV's and L/C filters, etc. like
Monster, Panasonic, etc. does. Why doesn't someone just make a small
all-in-one unit like big ones I've seen. Wouldn't that make more sense? I
would also think that it would cost less then the horrific prices that
monster charges for there way overpriced crap. I don't know much about the
rectifier units but the inverters were rather simple - a second year
electronics student could design one from the ground up.

"Bob" wrote in message
news:[email protected]
Perhaps I need a little education, but why is a UPS, uninterruptible power
supply needed for an entertainment system? Are they susceptible to damage
if the power is interrupted? I can see that for surges. The key reason for
a UPS on a pc is, because it is interactive, data may be lost or files
corrupted. Even a UPS with minimal capacity will allow for an orderly shut
down, either automatically or manually, or in the case of brief
interruptions, to continue working.

Home entertainment systems, including projection TV's often run off of a
very hot, hi intensity bulb used for the projection of the picture. These
bulbs require a cool down cycle via an internal fan that runs for a while
after the TV is turned off. Power would be required to run that fan. In the
event of an outage, the TV can be turned off and the bulb can be properly
cooled down. Bulbs can cost a few hundred dollars to replace. A UPS/Surge
protector can be good insurance.
Howard

"Howard" wrote in message
...
Home entertainment systems, including projection TV's often run off of a
very hot, hi intensity bulb used for the projection of the picture. These
bulbs require a cool down cycle via an internal fan that runs for a while
after the TV is turned off. Power would be required to run that fan. In
the event of an outage, the TV can be turned off and the bulb can be
properly cooled down. Bulbs can cost a few hundred dollars to replace. A
UPS/Surge protector can be good insurance.
Howard

It is NOT TRUE that these lamps require fan operation for cool down. I have
asked this question of every major vendor for which we are selling and
servicing these products and the answer is always the same. The cool down
cycle with the fan is to allow for a quicker restart availability. All
current models that I am awasre of will not restart a hot lamp. You CAN
damage a lamp with a hot restart, and they are aged faster with more
frequent restarts. The only benefits to a UPS are avoiding the restart at
all and the convenience of not having to restart the system. A good surge
suppressor and good grounding is all that is needed to protect a system.
Some units don't like running on a UPS and will shut down if the output is
not close to the sine wave that they equipment was designed to operate with.

Leonard

"Leonard Caillouet" wrote

It is NOT TRUE that these lamps require fan operation for cool down. I
have asked this question of every major vendor for which we are selling
and servicing these products and the answer is always the same. The cool
down cycle with the fan is to allow for a quicker restart availability.

Strange. My JVC owner's manual specifically warns of reduced lamp life with
improper shutdowns. It says nothing about hot restarts.