UPS – Stay Up When The Power Is Down

If you hear UPS and you think about the guys wearing the brown uniforms, you need to be introduced to the wonderful world of un-interrupted power.

What a UPS does
The purpose of a UPS is to provide power for a short time using a battery backup in times when the power at the outlet is not available. How long you have to work using the battery depends on the model of UPS you’re using as well as how much power you need based on the devices plugged in. As an extra bonus, a UPS is supposed to be an extremely reliable surge protector, so your equipment won’t get zapped in a storm.

Do photographers really need a UPS?
Having a UPS won’t make a difference for probably 99% of the time, but there have been at least 2 or 3 times when someone who works here at the studio (not going to mention names because I’m not planning on sleeping on the couch tonight) has forgotten to save frequently, and the power has gone out. Our house has old wiring, and sometimes even plugging in a vacuum cleaner or turning an extra device on can cause the breaker to trip, so we may have more of an issue here than you would have, but a storm or windy day can knock the power down even if your house has new wiring.

How to use a UPS
The UPS that we use has a group of plugins for devices that will need power during a power outage, and a group of plugins for devices that just need surge protection, but you don’t want to waste battery power on during an outage. You’ll want to plug your computer and monitor into the battery-enabled group, and things like printers and other non-essentials can get plugged into the other group.

Is it worth the cost?
I guess the question is how much your time is worth. For us, it was an easy decision. A small UPS is under $100, which means that it wouldn’t take long for the UPS to pay for itself after the first time it saved an hour of my time and Larissa’s time. Plus, it saves us from being frustrated, and that’s just as valuable as the time. Basically, if you can’t justify the cost, I’m thinking you probably don’t value your own time enough.

If you’re picking up what I’m putting down, you could always click my Amazon affiliate link below to say thank you =)

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 17th, 2011 at 5:43 pm and is filed under Tips And Tutorials For Photographers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.