Any UPS Recommendations or Advice?

Can anyone recommend a good UPS for a small office * setup. It will consist of a Dell Optiplex 2.4Ghz running only asterisk (with a Digium or Sangoma 3-port FXO card) + PoE switch + 3 Aastra 9133i phones.

I’d love for the phone system to be able to run for a couple of hours off battery, but from what I’ve seen that would cost $x,xxx to $xx,xxx which is way out of the budget. I need something in the mid $xxx range that would run for about 10 minutes to cover short outages and then shut down the server automatically.

huh ? go to google/froogle, put in UPS and your budget and see what you get.

If you can afford it, Powerware is the best UPS on the market in my opinion. However, they tend to be a bit more expensive than the less-capable brands like APC.

On the other hand, just about any UPS is better than no UPS. :smile:

A couple hours of battery time is asking a lot for a UPS. You can go to Powerware’s website (www.powerware.com) and use the UPS selector to pick on that meets your needs. I’m sure they have something that will work for you.

I suppose I was asking what type of VA rating that setup would need and are there any UPSes that will work with asterisk/linux to shut down just before the batteries die. I read somewhere that some of these programs just run on a timer and don’t take into consideration how much power is left in the batteries.

About the budget, it’s not set in stone so there is some wiggle room and if a little more is needed to get the 10 minutes of run time then I can probably get it.

The problem is determining which UPS will for about 10 minutes. Since I don’t have the components in hand, I don’t know how to estimate how much power they will require when combined and I was hoping someone had a similar setup and could share what they are using (manufacturer and size), how long it runs before shutting down and if it works with asterisk.

[quote=“Neiby”]If you can afford it, Powerware is the best UPS on the market in my opinion. However, they tend to be a bit more expensive than the less-capable brands like APC.

On the other hand, just about any UPS is better than no UPS. :smile:

A couple hours of battery time is asking a lot for a UPS. You can go to Powerware’s website (www.powerware.com) and use the UPS selector to pick on that meets your needs. I’m sure they have something that will work for you.[/quote]

Neiby, thanks for the Powerware recommendation. I hadn’t heard of them before, but their product specs look good and the prices aren’t that much more. I’m definitely looking into them more closely.