BIOS: Technology Means Business

Review:

The 800VA UPS is Belkin’s latest UPS (uninterruptible power supply). Designed for single desktop PCs or workstations, the 800VA UPS offers your computer protection against electrical surges, spikes, blackouts and lightning strikes. If your office looses power, the 800VA UPS will power up to four connected devices for around 45 minutes, which is more than enough time to save and close any applications you’re working on. The 800VA UPS will also protect your computer from freezing or shutting off due to power supply fluctuations.

The 800VA UPS is essentially a 450 watts emergency battery solution with AVR (Automatic Volt Regulation). It features one serial (RS-232) and one USB 1.1 port, four battery backup outlets with surge protection (three with battery back-up protection) and a RJ11/RJ45 port for your telephone, fax, modem or network connection. USB, serial and telephone cables are supplied. CRT monitors up to 19in. and TFT monitors up to 21in. are also protected.

Belkin also provides all 800VA UPS customers with a £100,000 Connected Equipment Warranty and Data Recovery Warranty. Should your computer malfunction due to the failure of the 800VA UPS while it’s properly connected, Belkin – in conjunction with ActionFront.com – will salvage remaining data and recover lost data from your hard disk. Any properly connected equipment that is damaged by a surge, including lighting, will be replaced up to a value of 100,000. A three-year product warranty also comes as standard.

AC power is provided through four surge-protected sockets (three of which provide battery backup). The USB 1.1 and serial connection to your PC lets the 800VA UPS work in conjunction with Belkin’s supplied PC software, Bulldog Plus. AVR technology increases ‘low’ or decreases ‘high’ voltage to a safe 220 to 230 volts. The internal battery is non-user replaceable so there’s no option for hot-swappable batteries.

The front of the 800VA UPS features three individually coloured LED indicators which specify certain functions on the UPS: Online, On Battery and Fault/Overload/Replace Battery. There’s also an On/Off/Test button. In the event of a power cut, the constant green Online LED will flash to indicate that the 800VA UPS’s AVR is active. The Yellow On Battery LED flashes yellow and emits an audible alarm (beeping) when the 800VA UPS’s battery is low and the shutdown procedure is imminent. The red Fault/Overload/Replace Battery LED will illuminate continuously when there’s a problem with the UPS or the battery is weak or bad and needs to be replaced. A flashing red LED means that the battery output is drawing more power than the UPS can provide.

In the event of power loss you’ll hear one of four types of audible alarm: slow alarm (UPS in is battery backup mode), rapid alarm (UPS is in battery backup mode and the battery energy is running low), continuous alarm (UPS is overloaded) and 10-second continuous bursts (output is shorted). You can, however, disable the audible alarms.

The bundled software, Bulldog Plus, works with Windows (9x, ME, NT, 2000 and XP), Mac, Unix, Linux and NetWare and assists you with shutting down your computer safely in the event of a power failure. It’s an excellent application that also provides diagnostic information, including the UPS’s charge status, battery status and condition and utility status on a single workstation or over a network. It even provides event logs and history graphs. The 800VA UPS can be used without the bundled software and the software doesn’t have to be installed to utilise the battery backup outlets, but is really needed to get the best level of protection.

The productivity of your business depends on the flawless operation of servers and workstations. One way to make sure they stay up and running, no matter what, is to invest in a power protection system such as a UPS. Belkin’s range of uninterruptible power supplies is relatively small compared to specialist UPS manufacturers, so it can’t currently cater for very large companies (multiple servers, computer rooms, data centres, plant floors and so on) with rack-mount solutions, but its 800VA UPS is a compact and good value solution for protecting single computers against power disturbances, including blackouts. It’s also backed up by an excellent set of warranties.