Ask HN: What UPS do you use with your Mac mini?
I need to power Mac mini M2 Pro, two external disks, keyboard, mouse, and monitor (~50W). All I want is to have a couple of minutes to shut things down properly and for the UPS to be able to tell the mac to shut down when running out of juice on its own via USB (e.g. when I'm AFK). I've read good things about APC (APC Back-UPS 650VA maybe?) and spare batteries seem to be readily available. Any other suggestions? Thank you!
3 comments
My advice:
Buy whatever $50 (or $100 or $1000) will get you and see if that works for you..
Not a decision worth optimizing.
They are all good enough and there is nothing special about a Mac Mini and there are no unusual requirements.
An UPS is just a box designed for marketing with a commodity switch and a commodity battery from a factory in China. [1]
What I mean is when -- after some number of years -- the battery goes so bad that the warning sound starts triggering, you can just open it up with a screwdriver, read the part number off the battery pack, and buy a replacement from Amazon or eBay or wherever.
[1]: unless of course it isn't like in many many industrial, enterprise, SMB and other critical use cases.
Buy whatever $50 (or $100 or $1000) will get you and see if that works for you..
Not a decision worth optimizing.
They are all good enough and there is nothing special about a Mac Mini and there are no unusual requirements.
An UPS is just a box designed for marketing with a commodity switch and a commodity battery from a factory in China. [1]
What I mean is when -- after some number of years -- the battery goes so bad that the warning sound starts triggering, you can just open it up with a screwdriver, read the part number off the battery pack, and buy a replacement from Amazon or eBay or wherever.
[1]: unless of course it isn't like in many many industrial, enterprise, SMB and other critical use cases.
You'll be able to do this on very low volt amps UPS'es with no problem as long as the included interfaces and software work on Apple MacOS Ventura. I'd bet you'd get 5 minutes or more on like an APC 350VA UPS. A lot of those would let you put the monitor on the surge protector side and not even draw from the battery so it would just be the Apple Mac Mini M2 and the (2) external disks (not sure if these are powered from USB-C or DC to AC adapter).
That load is below 100 watt total so even a cheap entry level UPS will do. APC is totally fine. Those things often take 12 volt 7-9ah gel batteries that cost less than $20 for a non-brand replacement.