> > > > > Hi > > > > > > Can someone point me to a new ups howto (the only one i can find is from > > > 1997). > > > > > > As far as I know you will not find anything newer in the LDP. > > It does explains the essentials of UPS handling quite well. > > > > Perhaps you would like to share what are you aiming at? > > > > I'm planing to buy a ups device in order to help my computers to survive the > winter's electricity breaks, but I don't know anything about it: > installation, hardware compatibility, software - what for & howto, etc. I > had some hard time finding this kind of information, I'll be glad to get a > url or two and ofcourse hardware recommendations and where to buy. > > Thanks, > Ishai. >
If you have time do read the UPS HOWTO. Although old, it will help you grasp the basic notions, which is what you need when buying a UPS. How much power would you need the UPS to support? The computation of this number might be not as simple as its looks, mainly because power supplies and monitors tends to draw larger amount of current when powered up. A URL for one of many UPS software is http://www.exploits.org/nut. It also has a responsive user and devel mailing lists. I am using an advice UPS (http://www.advice.co.il) to which I added a driver for the nut. However only the basic UPS functionality works, mainly because I do not have the full protocol. Another thing about my driver is that I need to update it since the nut's internals are getting modified. It does currently work, but I do not know for how long will the nut coordinator be patient with me. And this brings us to the usual fact with hardware: try to get a hardware for which its specifications and protocols are opened. Now the UPS HOWTO suggests one should buy a dumb UPS. Mine is smart. Yet I am not sure that if I would have to buy a UPS again I would not go for the dumb ones: They tend to be smaller in size, cheaper and their protocol is much simpler (and thus it is more likely that it will be opened). It also needs quite basic C knowledge in order to have a dumb UPS supported by the nut, provided that you know the (simple) protocol it uses. However, as far as I remember, there are no dumb UPS that can backup large power consumption. Ah, one more thing. The last paragraph refers to serial controlled UPSs. There are also USB ones, for which I am not sure what is the state of Linux software support. I know that the nut have a usb driver, but I do not know how generic it is and how good it is. I am also unsure for the Linux support for in PC UPS card, nor how good they are. -- Shaul Karl email: shaulka (replace these parenthesis with @) bezeqint, delete the comma and the white space characters and add .net ================================================================= To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
