Hi Guys!
I live in a Southern African country where the power supply is not the most reliable in the world (240V). We have occasional brown-outs but frequent black-outs. To counter this, I obviously have a 1500W UPS system attached to two truck batteries. The UPS is a Microtek 1500SEBz 'Sinewave' model. The allowed input range of the UPS is 180V-260V. The two batteries are from Taurus, filled, and they're both two years old.
Everything ran smoothly with my old PC setup. I'd have 3 HP PC computers pulling about 250W-300W each, and then three Hyundai TFTs pulling ~4.5A and a whole bunch of other paraphinalia. The UPS deals with the transition smoothly.
But now I bought two identical custom-built Corsair PCs with a CoolerMaster G550M 550W PSU that pulls a max of 500W (running at 4-8A). The videocard is an MSI GTX760.
Very quickly I noticed that these computers rebooted the instant the power fell out, despite the UPS kicking in.
Why?
To show that I haven't been lazy and have been doing a tonne of research on the matter, here are some eliminating tests I did:
1) Ran my old setup to check for deteriorating performance of the UPS and/or Batteries: Fine.
2) Ran just one corsair PC with no other device attached (to eliminate possible power distribution conflicts). If the PC is idle (just running desktop or some simple program, the doesn't trip when I play with the power switch at the wall. But if I make it run a video intensive program, like a PC Game (Assassin's Creed for example), it trips.
3) Surge protection after the UPS. I discovered that the socket strips (european) I used to distribute the power had surge protection inbuilt (SPD Type 3). I replaced them with a normal strip. No difference.
4) overloading the UPS. I'm not a big expert in PC electronics, but I thought it might be tripping because the Power unit of the Corsair (the Cooler Master) indicates a maximum of 8A that perhaps it was overloading the UPS with 1950Watts during peak performance while the UPS can only accommodate for 1500W. However, when running the Corsair, with Game running, on purely the UPS, it worked fine. And it wouldn't make sense that a 550W PC would pull 1900W... unless I'm wrong? But its definitely not overloading, and its definitely got to do with the transition of mains power > UPS.
5)Grounding. While the UPS is grounded, the PC's from the UPS were not grounded because the power strip plugs were European and the grounding contact didn't connect with the UPS's output socket. I exchanged this with a grounded power strip. I tested it by flicking the wall switch three times. Result: the Corsair PC, running the PC game, survived two outages, and upon the third, it tripped yet again.
6) faulty grounding: There is the possibility that the grounding in this house is not setup properly and that my grounding test from before didn't solve the problem. How do I test for this?
7) Wires too long. I thought perhaps the wires to the PC from the UPS was perhaps too long (or too thin) so I removed all wiring from between the PC and the UPS and replaced it with a short thick power cable. The results were similar to the earthing test, twice ok, third time trips. It must be said that on the second attempt at switching off the power, the TFT screen connected to the PC, and powered by another mains socket, went black for a second. This TFT is a 22 inch Hyundai. I've also noticed that if I plug in a device like a TFT screen on the same UPS circuit as the corsair that the corsair also trips.
8) UPS crap? We tried my setup on a similar Microtek 1400SEBz but this time with a light bulb attached to the circuit to see what the power was doing. We also attached a voltmeter. Upon disengaging the power source, the light bulb fluctuated almost to zero and back in a split second and off course the PC tripped again, but this time just running the desktop. The voltmeter read 230V before, dipped down to 170V and the UPS was pushing up to 270V. Does that mean that the UPS is crap? It might be obvious, but might a grounding problem cause the UPS to surge like that? Or does the Cooler Master have a surge protector interfering with the UPS?
Edit:
1. I have two identical Corsair PCs with these Cooler Master PSUs, and both behave the same.
2. I've just discovered that despite the presence of a ground wire in the sockets, the plugs are not effectively grounded. IE: the kettle gives me a light shock (right?)
So now what? Are these Corsair machines perhaps too sensitive for minor voltage spikes or 'switching surges'? Or is that also indicative of a grounding problem? Or is the UPS just crap?
ANY ideas would be most welcome!
Thanks in advance!
lex!
EDIT: Small update. Tomorrow I'm going to an expert on UPS's and we're going to look into converting it into a continuous inverter that charges the battery at the same time as delivering power. This way we can avoid having it dealing with the switch. Hopefully this will work!
I live in a Southern African country where the power supply is not the most reliable in the world (240V). We have occasional brown-outs but frequent black-outs. To counter this, I obviously have a 1500W UPS system attached to two truck batteries. The UPS is a Microtek 1500SEBz 'Sinewave' model. The allowed input range of the UPS is 180V-260V. The two batteries are from Taurus, filled, and they're both two years old.
Everything ran smoothly with my old PC setup. I'd have 3 HP PC computers pulling about 250W-300W each, and then three Hyundai TFTs pulling ~4.5A and a whole bunch of other paraphinalia. The UPS deals with the transition smoothly.
But now I bought two identical custom-built Corsair PCs with a CoolerMaster G550M 550W PSU that pulls a max of 500W (running at 4-8A). The videocard is an MSI GTX760.
Very quickly I noticed that these computers rebooted the instant the power fell out, despite the UPS kicking in.
Why?
To show that I haven't been lazy and have been doing a tonne of research on the matter, here are some eliminating tests I did:
1) Ran my old setup to check for deteriorating performance of the UPS and/or Batteries: Fine.
2) Ran just one corsair PC with no other device attached (to eliminate possible power distribution conflicts). If the PC is idle (just running desktop or some simple program, the doesn't trip when I play with the power switch at the wall. But if I make it run a video intensive program, like a PC Game (Assassin's Creed for example), it trips.
3) Surge protection after the UPS. I discovered that the socket strips (european) I used to distribute the power had surge protection inbuilt (SPD Type 3). I replaced them with a normal strip. No difference.
4) overloading the UPS. I'm not a big expert in PC electronics, but I thought it might be tripping because the Power unit of the Corsair (the Cooler Master) indicates a maximum of 8A that perhaps it was overloading the UPS with 1950Watts during peak performance while the UPS can only accommodate for 1500W. However, when running the Corsair, with Game running, on purely the UPS, it worked fine. And it wouldn't make sense that a 550W PC would pull 1900W... unless I'm wrong? But its definitely not overloading, and its definitely got to do with the transition of mains power > UPS.
5)Grounding. While the UPS is grounded, the PC's from the UPS were not grounded because the power strip plugs were European and the grounding contact didn't connect with the UPS's output socket. I exchanged this with a grounded power strip. I tested it by flicking the wall switch three times. Result: the Corsair PC, running the PC game, survived two outages, and upon the third, it tripped yet again.
6) faulty grounding: There is the possibility that the grounding in this house is not setup properly and that my grounding test from before didn't solve the problem. How do I test for this?
7) Wires too long. I thought perhaps the wires to the PC from the UPS was perhaps too long (or too thin) so I removed all wiring from between the PC and the UPS and replaced it with a short thick power cable. The results were similar to the earthing test, twice ok, third time trips. It must be said that on the second attempt at switching off the power, the TFT screen connected to the PC, and powered by another mains socket, went black for a second. This TFT is a 22 inch Hyundai. I've also noticed that if I plug in a device like a TFT screen on the same UPS circuit as the corsair that the corsair also trips.
8) UPS crap? We tried my setup on a similar Microtek 1400SEBz but this time with a light bulb attached to the circuit to see what the power was doing. We also attached a voltmeter. Upon disengaging the power source, the light bulb fluctuated almost to zero and back in a split second and off course the PC tripped again, but this time just running the desktop. The voltmeter read 230V before, dipped down to 170V and the UPS was pushing up to 270V. Does that mean that the UPS is crap? It might be obvious, but might a grounding problem cause the UPS to surge like that? Or does the Cooler Master have a surge protector interfering with the UPS?
Edit:
1. I have two identical Corsair PCs with these Cooler Master PSUs, and both behave the same.
2. I've just discovered that despite the presence of a ground wire in the sockets, the plugs are not effectively grounded. IE: the kettle gives me a light shock (right?)
So now what? Are these Corsair machines perhaps too sensitive for minor voltage spikes or 'switching surges'? Or is that also indicative of a grounding problem? Or is the UPS just crap?
ANY ideas would be most welcome!
Thanks in advance!
lex!
EDIT: Small update. Tomorrow I'm going to an expert on UPS's and we're going to look into converting it into a continuous inverter that charges the battery at the same time as delivering power. This way we can avoid having it dealing with the switch. Hopefully this will work!
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram