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Imagine only getting 5 min of battery to power a M1 Mac mini for $500 That Mac Mini must be so so so inefficient Edit: in OP's case it would need to also powe

Imagine only getting 5 min of battery to power a M1 Mac mini for $500 That Mac Mini must be so so so inefficient Edit: in OP's case it would need to also power the modem and router but yeah, still. Way more than 5 min

PaulHoule 4y ago
I had one of these with an extra battery https://www.bestbuy.com/site/apc-back-ups-pro-1000va-battery-back-up-system-black/6070800.p?skuId=6070800&ref=NS&loc=101 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/apc-back-ups-pro-1000va-battery... back in the day I had slow ADSL (2 Mbit/sec) from the phone company central office so my DSL would stay up when the power went out. That system could keep my DSL modem and cordless phone up and running for about two days or so, so with laptops and tablets I'd have 21st century comms for a weekend when the power goes out. They upgraded my DSL to ADSL2 served from a fiber node a mile or so from my house, now I get highly reliable and consistent 20 Mbit/sec, except when the power goes out in which case the node goes down. I donated the UPS to my local reuse center because there wasn't much point in it. I have a small tower computer I use as a server and thought about plugging it into the UPS but decided it wasn't worth the trouble because the runtime wouldn't be good. It would probably be better than 5 minutes, but it's not "run through a power outage", it is, "have a short period of terror in which to save your documents". Keeping the DSL up was "life-changing" though because it meant I could still keep in touch with the people at work.
- pwg 4y ago
  The value proposition for a UPS is not "run through a power outage" (most don't store enough energy for that purpose). The value proposition is both of these items below: 1) enough time to do a controlled shutdown instead of a hard power cut when a full power outage occurs; 2) the ability to ride through small 1-2 second power flickers that would otherwise result in a hard power cut for the computer.
  - PaulHoule 4y ago
    It's a pretty small market then. For case (2) there should be some super-capacitors in the power supply. For case (1) the answer is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crash-only_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crash-only_software as attempting a "clean shutdown" is a mug's game. Something that is a 30 second recovery after an uncontrolled shutdown often ends up taking 70 seconds when you attempt an uncontrolled shutdown. Systems are going to hard crash anyway, you might as well make that case robust rather than introduce more complex failure paths.
    - pwg 4y ago
      > For case (2) there should be some super-capacitors in the power supply. Agreed, but sadly, I am not aware of any PSU with super-capacitors installed so that it can ride out the 1-2 second flickers. So at the moment there is no built-in ability (besides exclusively using a laptop) to prevent the 1-2 second flickers from also causing a hard shutdown.

PaulHoule 4y ago

I had one of these with an extra battery https://www.bestbuy.com/site/apc-back-ups-pro-1000va-battery-back-up-system-black/6070800.p?skuId=6070800&ref=NS&loc=101 https://www.bestbuy.com/site/apc-back-ups-pro-1000va-battery... back in the day I had slow ADSL (2 Mbit/sec) from the phone company central office so my DSL would stay up when the power went out. That system could keep my DSL modem and cordless phone up and running for about two days or so, so with laptops and tablets I'd have 21st century comms for a weekend when the power goes out. They upgraded my DSL to ADSL2 served from a fiber node a mile or so from my house, now I get highly reliable and consistent 20 Mbit/sec, except when the power goes out in which case the node goes down. I donated the UPS to my local reuse center because there wasn't much point in it. I have a small tower computer I use as a server and thought about plugging it into the UPS but decided it wasn't worth the trouble because the runtime wouldn't be good. It would probably be better than 5 minutes, but it's not "run through a power outage", it is, "have a short period of terror in which to save your documents". Keeping the DSL up was "life-changing" though because it meant I could still keep in touch with the people at work.

pwg 4y ago
The value proposition for a UPS is not "run through a power outage" (most don't store enough energy for that purpose). The value proposition is both of these items below: 1) enough time to do a controlled shutdown instead of a hard power cut when a full power outage occurs; 2) the ability to ride through small 1-2 second power flickers that would otherwise result in a hard power cut for the computer.
- PaulHoule 4y ago
  It's a pretty small market then. For case (2) there should be some super-capacitors in the power supply. For case (1) the answer is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crash-only_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crash-only_software as attempting a "clean shutdown" is a mug's game. Something that is a 30 second recovery after an uncontrolled shutdown often ends up taking 70 seconds when you attempt an uncontrolled shutdown. Systems are going to hard crash anyway, you might as well make that case robust rather than introduce more complex failure paths.
  - pwg 4y ago
    > For case (2) there should be some super-capacitors in the power supply. Agreed, but sadly, I am not aware of any PSU with super-capacitors installed so that it can ride out the 1-2 second flickers. So at the moment there is no built-in ability (besides exclusively using a laptop) to prevent the 1-2 second flickers from also causing a hard shutdown.