Tripp-Lite SMART1500LCD UPS

[IrritateGuy]

Originally Posted by farout

i bought a APC home theater power conditioner. havin used it yet. any good or do you know anything about it.

APC makes hundreds of different products, so any opinion would be random.

I do know that TrippLite makes the most affordable and most complete power conditioning with technology which is basically identical to what everyone puts in their sub-$500 "power conditioners". Their "IsoBar" passive line filter technology is as good as it gets, and you can buy it in their $50 power strips with great results.

APC is a good company. Some of their products are very nice, and some are overpriced with cosmetic features that have very little to do with performance.

[JeffMackwood]

IG's the one who first turned me on to TrippLite - and their Isobar products in particular.

I just ordered another Isobar 4Ultra from Amazon.com to use with my new SVS sub. Delivered cost to my next hotel stop: $37.53US.

[JeffMackwood]

I brought the Tripp-Lite SMART1500LCD UPS home from my Orlando trip last week. The beast is heavy (and earned my big suitcase that I put it in two "heavy" stickers from the girl at check-in!) It also drew the attention of the boys in luggage screening since the bag was obviously rearranged - and had not one, but two, notices in it saying that the bag had been inspected.

I set it up yesterday. Only surprise was that its installation set up a ground loop hum that was very audible through my SVS sub - which seemed strange at first given that it shared no immediate power connections (the SVS being connected to the separate Isobar mentioned above). A lucky guess that the loop must have been through the line level connections, quickly led me to the culprit component (out of the 40 or so drawing power in the main HT), and a change of connections, seems to have caused the hum to go away.

I ran a self-test with all of the attached components powered-on and it handled the load without fault. When I get the chance I'll cut power to the HT to see how handles the attached load during a simulated power failure, and to get some idea as to how long the battery will last under full load (knowing that the biggest load, the projector, will be turned off and run through its cool down cycle right away in any real power failure - leaving only seven other low-draw components to worry about.)

One interesting feature is its display of input voltage. So far I've only seen it vary between 118v and 122v - sitting at 119-120v most of the time. I was surprised that even when I power on all of my amps at the same time (and they are connected to the same circuit) the display shows no drop in voltage at all. I had expected a very brief sag of at least a volt or two when their caps were all charging at exactly the same time.

[Towen7]

Originally Posted by JeffMackwood

One interesting feature is its display of input voltage. So far I've only seen it vary between 118v and 122v - sitting at 119-120v most of the time. I was surprised that even when I power on all of my amps at the same time (and they are connected to the same circuit) the display shows no drop in voltage at all. I had expected a very brief sag of at least a volt or two when their caps were all charging at exactly the same time.

I noticed that as well in my setup. The only time I saw movement of more than 5 volts or so was when the washing machine was running under heavy load.

Does the fan on your unit run constantly like mine does?

[JeffMackwood]

Originally Posted by Towen7

I noticed that as well in my setup. The only time I saw movement of more than 5 volts or so was when the washing machine was running under heavy load.

Does the fan on your unit run constantly like mine does?

The fan kicked on after 10-15 minutes of first plugging the unit in, and every time I've checked (like just now) it has been on.

I've got mine tucked towards the back of, and on a bottom shelf in, my gear shelves - and the back faces a non-reflective surface (cloth curtain) behind which is the rest of the basement. The fan noise seems to be almost all directed to the back and at a couple of feet in front of the unit I really can't hear it.