Does ASUS "Anti Surge Support" play well with APC Backups ?

[BillP]

Hi,

A customer with a Backups 500ES (battery replaced 1/2016) and an ASUS P8B75/M-CSM  motherboard had power wink out several times for maybe 15 seconds max the other day. This all happened within about a two minute period. The PC did not stay powered on as expected. After the power events, the PC would the not boot into Windows O/S, but  only to the UEFI login prompt (UEFI is password protected). I had them press the reset button several times and then it finally booted into Windows, and checkdsk ran automatically a couple times, then all was fine and Windows booted.

I have that PC at my office for a Windows upgrade. In the UEFI, in the Monitor tab (ie. fan speed temps, etc), I see that there's a setting called "Anti Surge Support" that's enabled. The description says, "If enabled, system will have uvp or ovp protection."

Do you have any knowledge of this setting interfering with, or reacting adversely with your Backups 500ES product?

Thank you for your assistance.

Regards . . .

P.S. There's something wrong with spaces between words in this thread editor.

[Anonymous user · Accepted solution]

Asus's claims are likely nothing more than marketing. Any specialized protections on the board would be ready to operate at all times, and not toggled on or off through some kind of setup utility. I suspect that if the option in setup does anything, all it would do is somehow interrupt the currently running program to provide an alert indicating that the computer's power supply may be malfunctioning. By that point it may already be too late.

Sudden shutdowns can point to a faulty battery. Even though the battery is only a year old at this point, I'd recommend testing it with a "dummy" load. Incandescent lamps work well for this. It is also possible that the UPS has developed a fault.

Another common problem that results in sudden shutdowns comes from computer power supplies that are sensitive to the incoming AC waveform. Potentially affected power supplies usually indicate the presence of an active power factor correction circuit. Some of these circuits are sensitive to the incoming AC power waveform. On utility power this should be a smooth sine wave. When the UPS switches to battery power and takes over in the face of a power outage, its inverter outputs a "modified" sine wave. This is actually a square wave with periodic drops to a zero output level.

If this is the problem you're having, only one of two things will cure it: changing to a UPS with a true sine wave output or changing out the computer's power supply. APC's Smart-UPS 750, 1000, 1500 and larger units all have a true sine wave output.

The "misisng spaces" issue is caused by certain web browsers, particularly those basing on a Webkit or Chrome/Blink foundation.

[voidstar_apc]

You could say the missing spaces are because those browsers insert non-breaking spaces sometimes, or you could say it's because the forum software doesn't convert them to true spaces, or you could say it's because APC's custom webfont has no glyph for a non-breaking space.

[BillP]

Thanks for the options William. I've marked your reply as answer.

I'm going to disable that switch, and (not always recommended) pull the AC plug to try to simulate the power outages. I'd rather use the circuit breaker, but that would disrupt other equipment there. Likewise, I'll try the same with that feature enabled. Let you all know what shakes. Although not pure sine, I have a new Back-UPS 700 (BN700NC) on the shelf and cna use that for some comparisions.

Btw voidstar, thanks for feedback on missing typed spaces. I'm doing this post in Firefox. See what happens when I save.

Regards . . .

P.S. After saving, all looks good in Firefox with spaces now. Must have been a Google Chrome issue.

P.S. Now I'm, looking at this in Google Chrome, and everything looks good here too today. Who knows what was up. No to worry.