I am building a pc with rtx 5060 and Ryzen 7700 on msi pro b650m-A with 32gb ddr5. Additionally I am using 650 W cooler master mwe 3.1 ATX compatible 80+ bronze psu. I am confused what should I go for UPS or pure sinewave Inverter. Online UPS are quite costly ( 20k range). Suggest me what should I go for, like only tell it from your experience what you are using?
used APC 600VA one - and moving to microtek legend 1000va. APC 1KVA is expensive, but performance wise nothing to complain.
What’s your pc specs? Especially the psu
The components you mentioned use around 145 + 105 + 100 = 350 W. 400 W Max if you include case fans, RGB tax. You’re looking at around 15-20 minutes of backup if you buy a UPS. Maybe more if the load is less. Please get at least 1100 VA.
A sine-wave inverter is more for the entire home, not just your PC. If you live in an area with frequent power cuts, then inverter works great.
I have both lol.
I would prefer to go with Inverter tbh. What invertor are you using?
Inverter is from Microtek, battery is Amaze.
APC BX1100 is enough for most.
1 Like
Any idea why these and even other ups have below 4 star reviews on amazon? I read few one star reviews mostly citing failures within couple of years.
1 Like
APC UPS are not as good as it used to be. Honestly, my BX1100 is 3.5 years old now, battery life is bad now, but still enough for 2-3mins of gaming, mainly to turn off game & then the PC, w/o gaming lasts 10mins. The fan is loud & noisy as well. But I never found a good alternative to this, so is an easy recommendation from me for 6k.
Other UPSes just die way too soon IMO. Friend had one from Microtek maybe, battery life became bad after a year.
4 Likes
using APC Back-UPS Pro, 1500VA with 2 additional 26AH batteries to get backup around 1.5-2 hrs backup.
How much did it cost you?
Isn’t it better to just get an inverter with 150Ah battery at this point?
I agree. I have a 1 kVA UPS from Fingers. The battery died after 1.5 years. They did replace the battery for free since it was under warranty, but next time this happens I’ll have to pay out of my pocket. I asked the service technician, and he said the same thing, these batteries don’t last that long, apparently.
Honestly, if you have the money, just get an inverter battery setup. It’s better in the long run.
I was using a Microtek 1kVA UPS for my PC with 750W PSU and RTX 3080. Was facing random restarts while playing Stalker 2 so upgraded to an Artis 1.5kVA few days back. Didn’t get time to test while playing yet but hopefully wont face the issue.
1 Like
all these UPS give out a modified sine wave which is what causes modern PSUs with active PFC to produce noise/whine as soon as switched to backup power. Now, I don’t know if this would cause any long term effects in the PSU circuit. Someone more knowledgeable may impart their wisdom on this.
Better would be to get an inverter (pure sine wave) with 150Ah battery. This setup would cost 13-14k and will last many years.
Tbh, For now I just ordered a vgaurd smart inverter. I already have inverter at home though the current one is not pure sinewave. So ordered the new vgaurd one to see how it works. I will leave a review once I set it up.
Well update: The Vgaurd seller from Amazon never delivered the product( from the reviews of the seller - apparantly the official seller of vgaurd inverters, have seller reviews that mention they often don’t deliver the product despite marked it as shipped) . So in short, if anyone is using inverter setup please suggest me some inverter for my pc setup. Possibly above 1200VA.
Exide GQP 1125VA is the best one u can get for about 7K inr.
2 Likes
A UPS typically lasts three or more system upgrades. I’ve two higher-end APC UPS in use, one is from 2015 and another 2018. APC also had home inverters in the product line-up some years ago, I really like those the most, I have the 850VA one:
Lead acid batteries are consumables, I don’t expect them to last more than a year or two.
The only way to get more longevity is to drastically oversize your battery.
In an ideal setup, if your computer pulls 500W then you’ll need a battery 20 times the size of that, to run it 20 hours to get a discharge rate of C20 (C = capacity, C20 = capacity/20).
C20 is what a lead acid battery is rated at for the capacity, so a 100Ah will provide 100Ah if it is discharged for 20 hours so 100/20 = 5A or 12V x 5A = 60W. Apart from capacity, this low discharge rate will give about 7 to 10 years of life, depending on the datasheet.
So you’ll need 500W * 20h = 10000Wh in your battery in the ideal setup, that’s 10000/12V = 830Ah, or 8x 100Ah batteries at a cost of about maybe Rs 50k. A bit ridiculous but then you wouldn’t need to worry about your UPS/inverter for ten years so it works out to 5k every year.
Or, you could just a buy a new battery every year, which works out to be more or less the same (8k for the first battery and a credit of 3k during exchange for all the others).
2 Likes
Excellent well detailed argument!
Let me know if I am wrong, the c20 is based on conclusion that I run my pc on inverter power for 20 hours straight right? But personally I plan to immediately shut it down when the electricity goes or at most run 5-15mins at very max if some critical update is ongoing. And considering my house already have an inverter setup ( it’s modified sine wave inverter with 180AH battery that’s why upgrading to pure sinewave) it’s gonna save me money on battery already. But your points overall makes great sense if the powerbackup required is few hours
The Watts x 20h calculation is for getting the longest life (in years) out of your battery as lead acid batteries are rated for C20 operation.
So you’ll get 100Ah out of a 100Ah battery and it will last as long as the warranty claims or longer, if your power draw is no more than C20 or 100Ah/20h = 5 amps which is 60W for a 12V battery.
As an example, Amaron says if you draw 25amps (300w) then you’ll only get 75Ah from a 100Ah Quanta battery, or a run time of 3 hours.
By getting 8x 100Ah batteries, a 500W load will only draw 500/8 = 60W or 5A from each battery, so not putting any kind of strain on them, allowing them to last a very long time, around a decade.
You could pragmatically go up to C10 or even C5 and still see a very long battery life.
Or just get one battery and replace it every year or two.
1 Like