House Power Failures and Mac

> On 2008-02-10 05:28:38 -0800, Dudley Henriques <dhenriques.TakeThisOut@rcn.com> said:
>
> > I guess I'm a normal home user with an IMac. I've been thinking about
> > how I use the computer vs a potential house power failure and how that
> > might effect the computer if it's on or sleeping when that happens.

I'm no expert, but many newsgroup posts I've seen in past years have
said that if you live in an area that has severe thunderstorms with
extreme lightning -- e.g., regions in the South -- and you don't have
some kind of transient suppression built into your basic house
electrical panel, damage to a plugged-in computer (and other household
appliances) can occur (though rarely).

In my area (Silicon Valley) we have a surprising number of power
failures -- several per year -- but I've never heard of damage to a
personal computer from this.
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

Dudley Henriques wrote:

I forgot to mention that I run Onyx manually every few weeks so the
scripts are being run and out of the on/off equation.


--
Dudley Henriques
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

In article <x5qdnac6O9KaYTPanZ2dnUVZ_rignZ2d RemoveThis @rcn.net>,
Dudley Henriques <dhenriques RemoveThis @rcn.com> wrote:

> I guess I'm a normal home user with an IMac. I've been thinking about
> how I use the computer vs a potential house power failure and how that
> might effect the computer if it's on or sleeping when that happens.
>
> My system is up for about 18 hours a day; either in use, on the screen
> saver; or in sleep mode. Sometimes when we go out I'll shut it down in
> case of a Thunderstorm, but otherwise it's up and running.
>
> I let it sleep all night usually and it's here I'm worried about a power
> failure and what that might do to the Mac.
>
>
> Obviously I could purchase a battery power supply backup system but
> that's a fairly large expense for a home user.
>
> Can you let me in on how some of you deal with this issue?
>
> One thing I'd like to know is how my Mac would suffer or not suffer in
> the event of a house power failure. My PC with Windows was a mess when
> this happened (twice) but so far I've been lucky with the IMac.
>
> If I do get nailed, what's the prospect for damage and are there built
> in utilities in my OSX that I can run after a failure to help restore
> things back to normal?
>
> How do you other home users deal with this?????
>
> Thanks much

Spend the money for a battery backup power supply. They come in a
variety of sizes and are priced accordingly.

No computer benefits from power failure. Ultimately the hard drive can
be destroyed by power failure.

--
Bill Collins
For email, change "fake" to "earthlink"
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

On 2/10/08 8:28 AMFeb 10, "Dudley Henriques" <dhenriques.DeleteThis@rcn.com> wrote:

> I guess I'm a normal home user with an IMac. I've been thinking about
> how I use the computer vs a potential house power failure and how that
> might effect the computer if it's on or sleeping when that happens.
....
> Obviously I could purchase a battery power supply backup system but
> that's a fairly large expense for a home user.
>

Spend the money. UPS units come in a variety of capacity and protection
ratings. An iMac should get by with a medium capacity - but check the power
ratings for your computer.

> Can you let me in on how some of you deal with this issue?

I have separate battery back up UPS units with surge protection and voltage
regulation on each of my Macs and another on the network gear (cable modem,
router and NAS)

The other thing you should do is to have back ups of your data. You can burn
CDs or DVDs, but I think that USB hard drives with a complete copy of you
user data is the way to go.

>
> One thing I'd like to know is how my Mac would suffer or not suffer in
> the event of a house power failure. My PC with Windows was a mess when
> this happened (twice) but so far I've been lucky with the IMac.
>

It varies. It could be nothing more than a reboot, but scrambled data on the
disk is possible. In the event of a brown out or a surge (both common with
power outages around here) you can also get severe damage to the hardware.


> If I do get nailed, what's the prospect for damage and are there built
> in utilities in my OSX that I can run after a failure to help restore
> things back to normal?

If you have hardware damage, no software is going to help. Some disk errors
can be fixed with the built in utilities like Disk Utility, but you might
want to have a commercial tool like Disk Warrior or Tech Tools on hand.
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

On Sun, 10 Feb 2008 10:24:00 -0600, Robert Haar wrote
(in article <C3D48F50.3EECCC%rlhaar@comcast.net>):

> If you have hardware damage, no software is going to help. Some disk errors
> can be fixed with the built in utilities like Disk Utility, but you might
> want to have a commercial tool like Disk Warrior or Tech Tools on hand.

Prior to my switching from a PowerBook to a MacBook Pro I had copies of both
Disk Warrior and Tech Tool Pro on hand but the truth was that I never
encountered a true need for either one of them, being able to address any
problems I had with my drives, both internal and external, with Apple's own
Disk Utility.

--
James Leo Ryan ..... Austin, Texas ..... taliesinsoft.DeleteThis@mac.com
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

In article <x5qdnac6O9KaYTPanZ2dnUVZ_rignZ2d DeleteThis @rcn.net>,
Dudley Henriques <dhenriques DeleteThis @rcn.com> wrote:

> I guess I'm a normal home user with an IMac. I've been thinking about
> how I use the computer vs a potential house power failure and how that
> might effect the computer if it's on or sleeping when that happens.
>
> My system is up for about 18 hours a day; either in use, on the screen
> saver; or in sleep mode. Sometimes when we go out I'll shut it down in
> case of a Thunderstorm, but otherwise it's up and running.
>
> I let it sleep all night usually and it's here I'm worried about a power
> failure and what that might do to the Mac.
>
> Obviously I could purchase a battery power supply backup system but
> that's a fairly large expense for a home user.
>
> Can you let me in on how some of you deal with this issue?

We have around 8 or 9 Macs in our household. All of them are connected
to APC uninterruptible power supplies / surge protectors.

We have two APC Back-UPS RS 1500s (just under $200 each from buy.com)
for our two Power Mac G5 towers, a Mac mini that serves as our resident
Windows box, cable modem, wireless router, Ethernet switch, and all the
standard computer peripherals (a flat bed scanner, various USB devices,
speakers, displays, and so on). APC UPS systems typically have surge
protect only power ports as well as power backup power ports. Only the
cable modem, router, switch, the computers themselves and select
displays are connected to the power backup ports. The rest of the
equipment is connected to surge protect only ports.

According to apcacccess (part of the "apcupsd" suite of tools), my G5
tower and the Mac mini running Windows, connected to the first RS 1500
will stay powered for roughly 15.6 minutes in the event of a prolonged
power failure. According to apcaccess, my wife's G5 tower, connected to
the second RS 1500, will run for approximately 33.2 minutes in the event
of a prolonged power failure.

We have a Mac mini functioning as a DNS, HTTP, AFP, SMB, backup, (insert
various other services here) server in the office closet. It's got a
4-bay Firewire hard drive enclosure functioning as a 1.5 terabyte
concatenated RAID volume for our file server, and a Exabyte VXA2
firewire tape drive for automated daily backups. There is also a Mac
SE/30 and web camera sitting on the closet shelf that runs a 24/7 web
server with a picture of the web cam pointed at itself showing the web
log (http://zippy.kicks-ass.org:9997). All of that is connected to its
own APC UPS Back-UPS ES 725 (around $100 from Fry's Electronics).
According to apcaccess, the Mac mini in the closet will run for
approximately 20 minutes in the event of a prolonged power failure.

If you plan to purchase a power backup / surge protection system, it's
important to realize that they are not all equal. You should gauge the
model you buy based on the power draw of the devices you plan to plug
into it. If you don't do this, you may end up with a UPS that does not
protect your equipment well enough, or a UPS that provides more
protection than you need and is more expensive than you need.

Luckily, APC has a *very* handy wizard on their web site that helps you
determine what type of power backup unit you need. You input the power
specifications of all the equipment you plan to plug into the unit, and
they give you a list of the units that match those power requirements:

<http://apc.com/sizing/selectors.cfm>

As I mentioned, I use a software package called apcupsd
(<http://www.apcupsd.org/>) to monitor and control my Macs that are
hooked up to power protection. While this software requires some
experience using the command line to build, install, and configure the
package, it's also extremely full-featured and robust for the price.
With it, you can hook up multiple computers to the same UPS, and
automatically shut them all down gracefully before the battery dies
during a prolonged power outage. Software that does this normally costs
a good bit of money, and may not run on Mac OS X. apcupsd is free (open
source) and does it well. The expense is that you get to build, install,
and configure it yourself using the command line. For me, it's worth
that expense!

A lot of our family members live in New Orleans, Louisiana where
thunderstorms are very strong and houses are commonly not wired well for
lightning. Before I got several of my family members to start using APC
UPS systems to protect their Macs, they lost many Ethernet ports, modem
ports, power supplies, and so on to lightning strikes to their homes.
For the past few years after they got APC UPS units, not one of them has
had such a problem.

We have lived for 8 or 9 years in an area in Austin, Texas that gets
lots of heavy thunderstorms throughout the year. I have no worries
leaving our equipment running through thee worst of these storms. These
things are well worth the money, in my mind.

> One thing I'd like to know is how my Mac would suffer or not suffer in
> the event of a house power failure. My PC with Windows was a mess when
> this happened (twice) but so far I've been lucky with the IMac.
>
> If I do get nailed, what's the prospect for damage and are there built
> in utilities in my OSX that I can run after a failure to help restore
> things back to normal?

As other have mentioned, your computer can sustain damage in several
ways, even during power outages. If the power goes out while data is
cached but not written to disk, file and directory corruption can be the
result. If a surge or spike hits your power circuit, Ethernet ports are
commonly the first to get zapped. I've seen power supplies and other
ports bite the dust as well. There's no recovery from that once it
happens - the component is typically dead from then on.

Considering that having a UPS can protect you from those to problems, I
figure it's worth the expense.

Note that only unplugging the equipment from the power outlet can
protect your equipment from a direct lightning hit. But those are very
rare, and you have other more important things to worry about if that
should happen. What UPSs protect you from are the more common issues
like power outages, spikes, lows, and surges.

--
Note: Please send all responses to the relevant news group. If you
must contact me through e-mail, let me know when you send email to
this address so that your email doesn't get eaten by my SPAM filter.

JR
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

In article <2008021007531216807-christophercampbell@hotmailcom>,
C J Campbell <christophercampbell.RemoveThis@hotmail.com> wrote:

> You probably do not need battery backup. In theory, if your computer
> was writing to the hard drive at the exact moment that the power went
> out, you could corrupt that sector. If not that, you will certainly
> lose whatever it was that was being saved.

Keep in mind, too, that data can and does stay in memory sometimes for
prolonged periods before the operating system actually flushes that data
to disk. If the system loses power during that time, that data is lost.
Directory and file corruption can occur this way. I consider this a need
for power backup - if for no other reason than to give the system a
chance to flush the disk buffers and shut down gracefully.

--
Note: Please send all responses to the relevant news group. If you
must contact me through e-mail, let me know when you send email to
this address so that your email doesn't get eaten by my SPAM filter.

JR
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

And another benefit to the APC UPS that I have is that they plug into
the Mac with a USB Cable, and it goes right into the Energy Saver under
System Preferences, and it sees the UPS I have. There I get to
determine when to shut down the Mac - in minutes of battery life on the
UPS.

Which should be a Godsend to those who leave their Mac running when the
are not around to babysit it for situations like this.

H.
==============
In article
<jollyroger-8A70C5.12312410022008 RemoveThis @earthlink.vsrv-sjc.supernews.net>,
Jolly Roger <jollyroger RemoveThis @pobox.com> wrote:

> In article <x5qdnac6O9KaYTPanZ2dnUVZ_rignZ2d RemoveThis @rcn.net>,
> Dudley Henriques <dhenriques RemoveThis @rcn.com> wrote:
>
> > I guess I'm a normal home user with an IMac. I've been thinking about
> > how I use the computer vs a potential house power failure and how that
> > might effect the computer if it's on or sleeping when that happens.
> >
> > My system is up for about 18 hours a day; either in use, on the screen
> > saver; or in sleep mode. Sometimes when we go out I'll shut it down in
> > case of a Thunderstorm, but otherwise it's up and running.
> >
> > I let it sleep all night usually and it's here I'm worried about a power
> > failure and what that might do to the Mac.
> >
> > Obviously I could purchase a battery power supply backup system but
> > that's a fairly large expense for a home user.
> >
> > Can you let me in on how some of you deal with this issue?
>
> We have around 8 or 9 Macs in our household. All of them are connected
> to APC uninterruptible power supplies / surge protectors.
>
> We have two APC Back-UPS RS 1500s (just under $200 each from buy.com)
> for our two Power Mac G5 towers, a Mac mini that serves as our resident
> Windows box, cable modem, wireless router, Ethernet switch, and all the
> standard computer peripherals (a flat bed scanner, various USB devices,
> speakers, displays, and so on). APC UPS systems typically have surge
> protect only power ports as well as power backup power ports. Only the
> cable modem, router, switch, the computers themselves and select
> displays are connected to the power backup ports. The rest of the
> equipment is connected to surge protect only ports.
>
> According to apcacccess (part of the "apcupsd" suite of tools), my G5
> tower and the Mac mini running Windows, connected to the first RS 1500
> will stay powered for roughly 15.6 minutes in the event of a prolonged
> power failure. According to apcaccess, my wife's G5 tower, connected to
> the second RS 1500, will run for approximately 33.2 minutes in the event
> of a prolonged power failure.
>
> We have a Mac mini functioning as a DNS, HTTP, AFP, SMB, backup, (insert
> various other services here) server in the office closet. It's got a
> 4-bay Firewire hard drive enclosure functioning as a 1.5 terabyte
> concatenated RAID volume for our file server, and a Exabyte VXA2
> firewire tape drive for automated daily backups. There is also a Mac
> SE/30 and web camera sitting on the closet shelf that runs a 24/7 web
> server with a picture of the web cam pointed at itself showing the web
> log (http://zippy.kicks-ass.org:9997). All of that is connected to its
> own APC UPS Back-UPS ES 725 (around $100 from Fry's Electronics).
> According to apcaccess, the Mac mini in the closet will run for
> approximately 20 minutes in the event of a prolonged power failure.
>
> If you plan to purchase a power backup / surge protection system, it's
> important to realize that they are not all equal. You should gauge the
> model you buy based on the power draw of the devices you plan to plug
> into it. If you don't do this, you may end up with a UPS that does not
> protect your equipment well enough, or a UPS that provides more
> protection than you need and is more expensive than you need.
>
> Luckily, APC has a *very* handy wizard on their web site that helps you
> determine what type of power backup unit you need. You input the power
> specifications of all the equipment you plan to plug into the unit, and
> they give you a list of the units that match those power requirements:
>
> <http://apc.com/sizing/selectors.cfm>
>
> As I mentioned, I use a software package called apcupsd
> (<http://www.apcupsd.org/>) to monitor and control my Macs that are
> hooked up to power protection. While this software requires some
> experience using the command line to build, install, and configure the
> package, it's also extremely full-featured and robust for the price.
> With it, you can hook up multiple computers to the same UPS, and
> automatically shut them all down gracefully before the battery dies
> during a prolonged power outage. Software that does this normally costs
> a good bit of money, and may not run on Mac OS X. apcupsd is free (open
> source) and does it well. The expense is that you get to build, install,
> and configure it yourself using the command line. For me, it's worth
> that expense!
>
> A lot of our family members live in New Orleans, Louisiana where
> thunderstorms are very strong and houses are commonly not wired well for
> lightning. Before I got several of my family members to start using APC
> UPS systems to protect their Macs, they lost many Ethernet ports, modem
> ports, power supplies, and so on to lightning strikes to their homes.
> For the past few years after they got APC UPS units, not one of them has
> had such a problem.
>
> We have lived for 8 or 9 years in an area in Austin, Texas that gets
> lots of heavy thunderstorms throughout the year. I have no worries
> leaving our equipment running through thee worst of these storms. These
> things are well worth the money, in my mind.
>
> > One thing I'd like to know is how my Mac would suffer or not suffer in
> > the event of a house power failure. My PC with Windows was a mess when
> > this happened (twice) but so far I've been lucky with the IMac.
> >
> > If I do get nailed, what's the prospect for damage and are there built
> > in utilities in my OSX that I can run after a failure to help restore
> > things back to normal?
>
> As other have mentioned, your computer can sustain damage in several
> ways, even during power outages. If the power goes out while data is
> cached but not written to disk, file and directory corruption can be the
> result. If a surge or spike hits your power circuit, Ethernet ports are
> commonly the first to get zapped. I've seen power supplies and other
> ports bite the dust as well. There's no recovery from that once it
> happens - the component is typically dead from then on.
>
> Considering that having a UPS can protect you from those to problems, I
> figure it's worth the expense.
>
> Note that only unplugging the equipment from the power outlet can
> protect your equipment from a direct lightning hit. But those are very
> rare, and you have other more important things to worry about if that
> should happen. What UPSs protect you from are the more common issues
> like power outages, spikes, lows, and surges.
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

AES <siegman DeleteThis @stanford.edu> wrote:

> I'm no expert, but many newsgroup posts I've seen in past years have
> said that if you live in an area that has severe thunderstorms with
> extreme lightning -- e.g., regions in the South -- and you don't have
> some kind of transient suppression built into your basic house
> electrical panel, damage to a plugged-in computer (and other household
> appliances) can occur (though rarely).

Damage to plugged in appliances is far from a rare occurrence during
thunderstorms. Take it from someone living in Northeast Florida, it's
quite common.

--
<http://designsbymike.net/shop/mac.cgi> Mac and geek T-shirts & gifts
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<http://designsbymike.net/shop/prius.cgi> Prius shirts/bumper stickers
<http://bogart-tribute.net> Tribute to Humphrey Bogart
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

In article <1ic3irz.1e901ll1328i06N%mikePOST@TOGROUPmacconsult.com>,
mikePOST.RemoveThis@TOGROUPmacconsult.com (Mike Rosenberg) wrote:

> AES <siegman.RemoveThis@stanford.edu> wrote:
>
> > I'm no expert, but many newsgroup posts I've seen in past years have
> > said that if you live in an area that has severe thunderstorms with
> > extreme lightning -- e.g., regions in the South -- and you don't have
> > some kind of transient suppression built into your basic house
> > electrical panel, damage to a plugged-in computer (and other household
> > appliances) can occur (though rarely).
>
> Damage to plugged in appliances is far from a rare occurrence during
> thunderstorms. Take it from someone living in Northeast Florida, it's
> quite common.

That's been my experience as well. If you are living in the deep South,
and you own a computer and value your equipment, a UPS is not optional.
I've lost count of how many friend Ethernet ports I've seen down there.

--
Note: Please send all responses to the relevant news group. If you
must contact me through e-mail, let me know when you send email to
this address so that your email doesn't get eaten by my SPAM filter.

JR
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

In article <x5qdnac6O9KaYTPanZ2dnUVZ_rignZ2d DeleteThis @rcn.net>,
Dudley Henriques <dhenriques DeleteThis @rcn.com> wrote:

> I guess I'm a normal home user with an IMac. I've been thinking about
> how I use the computer vs a potential house power failure and how that
> might effect the computer if it's on or sleeping when that happens.
>
> My system is up for about 18 hours a day; either in use, on the screen
> saver; or in sleep mode. Sometimes when we go out I'll shut it down in
> case of a Thunderstorm, but otherwise it's up and running.
>
> I let it sleep all night usually and it's here I'm worried about a power
> failure and what that might do to the Mac.
>
>
> Obviously I could purchase a battery power supply backup system but
> that's a fairly large expense for a home user.
>
> Can you let me in on how some of you deal with this issue?
>
> One thing I'd like to know is how my Mac would suffer or not suffer in
> the event of a house power failure. My PC with Windows was a mess when
> this happened (twice) but so far I've been lucky with the IMac.

Aside from surge damage the biggest problem is if the hard drive is
saving when power goes out. You can get significant drive corruption in
that case if you are real unlucky. But if the drive is spun down
(including when the computer is asleep) then the only thing you'll lose
are unsaved changes, stuff you've typed in but haven't saved yet.

--
Clark Martin
Redwood City, CA, USA Macintosh / Internet Consulting

"I'm a designated driver on the Information Super Highway"
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

In article <rowbotth-808C2A.12581910022008.TakeThisOut@news.newsgroupdirect.com>,
Rowbotth <rowbotth.TakeThisOut@telusplanet.net> wrote:

> And another benefit to the APC UPS that I have is that they plug into
> the Mac with a USB Cable, and it goes right into the Energy Saver under
> System Preferences, and it sees the UPS I have. There I get to
> determine when to shut down the Mac - in minutes of battery life on the
> UPS.

Yep. I would use the built-in support, only it doesn't allow you to
shut down *multiple* computers that are connected to the UPS. apcupsd
lets you do that, and is more configurable as well.

--
Note: Please send all responses to the relevant news group. If you
must contact me through e-mail, let me know when you send email to
this address so that your email doesn't get eaten by my SPAM filter.

JR
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac 

In article
<jollyroger-36F8B7.13000610022008.TakeThisOut@earthlink.vsrv-sjc.supernews.net>,
Jolly Roger <jollyroger.TakeThisOut@pobox.com> wrote:

> I've lost count of how many friend Ethernet ports I've seen down there.

*fried* ; )

--
Note: Please send all responses to the relevant news group. If you
must contact me through e-mail, let me know when you send email to
this address so that your email doesn't get eaten by my SPAM filter.

JR
 >> Stay informed about: House Power Failures and Mac