News You Can Bruise for 2004 September 20

Permalink [Comments] (3) Mon Sep 20 2004 19:49 Deadbeat UPS:

I bought a UPS a while ago at a yard sale for $10, and I thought it was a pretty good bargain. But then it got lazy or something, because it embarked on a campaign designed to get me to stop using it. Every once in a while it would pretend the power had gone off and beep, beep, beep. Real annoying. The only way to get it to stop was to push the button on the front, which... turned off the power. So instead of a machine that protected my computer in the event of power outages, it was a machine that simulated localized power outages affecting only my computer.

Since I'm not afraid of power outages due to ext3, it's now sitting on my computer room floor enjoying an undeserved retirement. That's the story of the deadbeat UPS.

technology

Comments:

Posted by Gary Benson at Tue Sep 21 2004 05:22

Mine used to have a little self-test every week, where it'd bleep and fire up its little fans and flash its little lights for a couple of minutes...

Posted by Leonard at Tue Sep 21 2004 09:28

Hmm. Seems to me it happened erratically, not just once a week. But the one time I could stand to just leave it alone, it eventually stopped. Of course it didn't come with a manual, but there's probably a PDF of it online.

Posted by dave at Mon Sep 27 2004 14:27

You probably need a new battery...check eBay, they are cheap there...

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