Shutdown without UPS reboot possible?

[Anonymous user]

Hi,

I've been an APC customer for many years, currently running several SmartUPS 1500's. I just recently installed PCBE on a PC and though I had previously thought that communication was only possible via a Network card, I got it up and running via USB.

However, then I discovered the hard way that there is -- apparently -- no way to prevent the UPS from shutting down and rebooting after a power failure when the UPS is under the control of PCBE via UPS. I'm puzzled -- mystified, really -- as to why an "uninterruptible power supply" would intentionally interrupt itself and shut itself down when under software control. Yet when it runs on its own and there's an outage, as long as the battery doesn't run out, it will come back online when the power returns without rebooting. That is the essence of a UPS!

In an effort to "fool" the system and prevent this reboot from occurring, I configured the settings so that the battery would need to acquire a 25% charge before rebooting. My thinking was that if the battery held a greater charge that a reboot of the UPS would never happen. As a test, I pulled the power and waited for my computer to shut down. At that point, 4 out of 5 LED's were lit on the battery meter, which represents (roughly) an 80% charge. But still, the UPS rebooted. GAH!

In short, I don't want the UPS to ever reboot. Is there a way to accomplish this? Specifically...

Is there any possible way to configure PCBE running via USB to prevent the UPS from ever powering down? And if not, would it be possible to achieve this behavior via the Network card?

Thank you for taking time to read this.

Regards,

Peter

[Anonymous user]

Hi,

I've been an APC customer for many years, currently running several SmartUPS 1500's. I just recently installed PCBE on a PC and though I had previously thought that communication was only possible via a Network card, I got it up and running via USB.

However, then I discovered the hard way that there is -- apparently -- no way to prevent the UPS from shutting down and rebooting after a power failure when the UPS is under the control of PCBE via UPS. I'm puzzled -- mystified, really -- as to why an "uninterruptible power supply" would intentionally interrupt itself and shut itself down when under software control. Yet when it runs on its own and there's an outage, as long as the battery doesn't run out, it will come back online when the power returns without rebooting. That is the essence of a UPS!

In an effort to "fool" the system and prevent this reboot from occurring, I configured the settings so that the battery would need to acquire a 25% charge before rebooting. My thinking was that if the battery held a greater charge that a reboot of the UPS would never happen. As a test, I pulled the power and waited for my computer to shut down. At that point, 4 out of 5 LED's were lit on the battery meter, which represents (roughly) an 80% charge. But still, the UPS rebooted. GAH!

In short, I don't want the UPS to ever reboot. Is there a way to accomplish this? Specifically...

Is there any possible way to configure PCBE running via USB to prevent the UPS from ever powering down? And if not, would it be possible to achieve this behavior via the Network card?

Thank you for taking time to read this.

Regards,

Peter

[BillP]

Peter,

From your description it appears you have a SUA model Smart-UPS. PowerChute is specifically designed to power down the UPS after OS has been powered down. The reason is, 99% of customers want the UPS to power down so that power will be cut to the computer. Then when power is restored if the BIOS is set properly the computer will restart automatically without user intervention. If the UPS does not power down and say that AC is restored before the battery completely fails the UPS will continue to provide power to the outlets and the computer would have to be restarted manually. Also, the UPS is commanded down to prevent the UPS battery/s from be completely drained.

If you want a Smart-UPS that will work with PowerChute Business Edition and not power down the entire UPS you should purchase a SMT or SMX Smart-UPS. These models have switchable outlets so you can configured the software not to power down the UPS and only power down 1 of the outlet groups or none of the outlets.

If you uninstalled PowerChute Business Edition and install PowerChute Network Shutdown the OS will communicate with the SUA UPS via the NMC. PowerChute Network Shutdown can be configured to not send a shutdown command to the UPS.

[BillP · Accepted solution]

Hi,

PCNS version 3.1 supports most Microsoft OS but does not support Mac OS X. PCNS 3.0.1 does support Mac 10.8 and 10.7 along with Microsoft OS. The compatibility chart list all compatible OS

http://www.apcmedia.com/salestools/SJHN-7AYQNP/SJHN-7AYQNP_R54_EN.pdf.

PCNS 4.0 which should be released before 1 January 2015 will support Mac 10.9 and 10.10 along with most Microsoft server OS and recent Microsoft desktop OS e.g Windows 7 and Windows 8.

In all cases you can configure PCNS to not shut down the UPS.