[PLUG] Recommendations for new UPS

John Jason Jordan johnxj at comcast.net
Sat Jan 29 01:45:01 UTC 2011


On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 16:46:00 -0800
Russell Senior <russell at personaltelco.net> dijo:

>>>>>> "John" == John Jason Jordan <johnxj at comcast.net> writes:
>
>John> Great idea!  Unfortunately, the price for the BX1500G from APC
>John> with trade-in is $206 and I can get it from Amazon without
>John> trade-in for $185. :(
>
>Wait, why are you trading in?  Just replace the batteries!  I've used
>the place on SE 20th and Belmont.  There is another place (affiliated?)
>further out Belmont, a few blocks west of 39th.  Likely to be cheaper
>than Batteries Plus.  The batteries are Sealed Lead Acid (SLA) and
>come in standard sizes.  There is a 99.9% chance that either of those
>places with have a replacement for probably no more than $40 or so
>each.
>
>It's generally a bad idea to mail-order SLA batteries.  They are heavy
>as lead (joke-joke) and shipping costs are prodigious.

I called Batteries Plus on 30th and Broadway, and Northwest Battery
Supply on 37th and Belmont. Both had the batteries in stock (it takes
two), but they both wanted $120 for the pair. I agree that getting them
online is nuts with the shipping cost, plus the cheapest online price I
could get was $149. 

Note that this is not a wimpy UPS. It's 1500VA and 900 watts. I'm sure
batteries for some of the smaller UPS models are lots cheaper. 

Considering that I can get a brand new APC BR1500G for $179 at Best Buy
(Jantzen Beach) or at Walmart for $175, I have decided to just get a
new one. The new one has a nice LCD screen that gives me more details
about what is going on than the old model. Plus, the replacement
batteries carry only a one year warranty, where the new unit carries a
three year warranty, including the batteries. And the new one comes
with a long USB cable. And to clinch the deal, my old one is dusty and
the new one will be clean and shiny. 

The old one, complete with beepy batteries, will soon become available
to whoever wants it. 



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