Questions about UPS+surge protector

[Peter L. Peres]

You do not say how many computers. Typically a 400VA UPS with 12V 7Ah
battery will keep a Pentium machine and a 15" monitor going for up to 20
minutes. Most power failures will be under 5 minutes. There is a
classification for this, ask your electricity company.

All UPSs with serial connection will talk to Linux ups daemons, in
so-called 'dumb' mode, using a simple serial cable: means you get power
failure/power back signalling, and low battery indication. Smart implies
you have real time display of voltage, battery status, amps, etc. I have
not yet used a UPS with USB with a Linux machine.

As a simple rule of thumb, add the nameplate ratings of the monitor and
computer (e.g. 500W PSU + 100W monitor = 600W) and get a UPS with similar
nameplate rating (600VA). this is not entirely correct but it should be
close enough for your purposes (the VAs are Ws corrected for the power
factor, aka caos phi. VAs are also known as real power. Some equipment
has really high cos phi).

Peter
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