PowerWalker VI 800 SW/UK 480W Pure Sine Wave IEC UPS

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*Update (December 2015): Once again it started to emit a steady tone (not intermittent beeps) when I was away. There was no power cut, and no safeties had tripped in the house breaker panels. Following similar episodes last month, I cannot trust this device and I am replacing it with the more modern version with the blue display panel. I am also asking Amazon to make the necessary financial corrections. I am downgrading to 3 stars and not 2 because it did work for over a year with the PFC power supplies in my PC rebuilds, even if the software never did.*Update (November 2015): I have had two sudden PC crashes (sudden and total loss of power) in two days; one with no reason, the second with a steady 'bleep' from this device that (I think) means a system error in the UPS. Can it be on its way out after just over a year, with a low 25% load on it? (Only one bar out of four on the output side.) This is a bit worrying. It's at times like this you wish the device came with decent software and diagnostics.*Update (March 2015): Still fine. It is now driving two PCs (separately, not together) both with modern Corsair PSUs, and neither of them is protesting or making odd sounds. I conclude that the sine wave output is good. Voltages seem bang-on.*Review: I have owned many UPS systems over the last 20 years, including APC, Borri and Riello. At the Amazon price of around seventy quid this one is amazing value. Points to note:[] Size. Very compact as these things go. Facing the front panel the *approximate* dimensions are: (W) 95mm; (H) 145mm measured from the bottom of its rubber grommets; (D) 330mm measured front to back. It's a sort of rectangular 'sausage' shape. Allow extra on depth for the cables.[] Connections. One 'kettle' input (from mains) and three 'kettle' output (to equipment). There's also a USB port so you can connect the UPS to your PC and use software to monitor/manage it; and other connectors to filter your phone/modem line. No Ethernet filtering. Good luck with the software, by the way. (See below.)[] Operations. Pretty simple. Plug in, allow it to charge for four hours, then follow the instructions. Mine came showing it was fully charged so I took a punt and didn't give it the full four hours. *The manufacturer recommends a 20cm gap around the product to avoid risk of interfering with other electronic kit in your setup.*[] Display. Shows input voltage, output voltage, and whether being driven from mains or the battery. If you're bored, ask someone to power-up a vacuum cleaner and you can watch the voltage drop on the panel. After you turn the UPS off the front panel stays lit and shows zero output voltage. At night, the front panel is so bright you can almost read a book by it.[] Management software. Oh dear. *Set a Restore Point* before you install it is my advice. I downloaded ViewPower software from the PowerWalker website. It did not install properly. I tried the DVD version that came in the box. That didn't install. I tried the alternative PowerWalker download just in case. That didn't work. I tried the alternative third-party software via the PowerWalker website. That not only failed to run, but it never announced when the install had completed *and* it installed a new device in Device Manager ... and it never ran or worked either. As a result I cannot 'manage' this UPS - but it's not a deal breaker, given the value. You'd think Windows 7 could actually drive a UPS in 2014. Apparently Mac systems can. Nuts. You may be more lucky.[] Noise/heat. It hums softly, and the top gets a bit, well, 'warm' is being a bit charitable. The humming was a disappointment, as none of my other UPS systems does this. It's not a great big buzz and I had no problem sleeping with this at the foot of the bed.[] Battery replacement. There's no mention of this that I can see, so the trade-off of its low price may be that you will need to buy a whole new one when it times-out. Still, against competitive pure sine wave alternatives costing three times the price ... make up your own mind.If you want to look at other 'pure sine wave' UPS systems (not necessarily on Amazon) there's the Borri B200, CyberPower's pure sine wave ones, and the mid/upper models in the APC Smart-UPS range. Some of them may offer replaceable batteries, and APC's desktop PC software is pretty good.

My old Eaton EX 1500 UPS (which was in excess of 6 years old) recently stopped working properly and, after finding the correct replacement batteries, I was told it could also be a fault with the internal charger responsible for maintaining the batteries. So I started looking for a whole new UPS. I did a few loops of Google, Amazon as well as APC's website (which wasn't enjoyable to use) and, after finding hardly any reviews and definitive information on which UPS to buy on Google or so called 'specialist' websites, I went with this Powerwalker 2200.First impressions are that this UPS is fantastic! In normal mode it's almost totally silent - so if you work in a home office you won't notice it over the usual hum of your computer - which is great, as my old Eaton EX 1500 had a fan that was always on. During normal operation, there's a slight buzzing noise, but it's barely noticeable - it's likely just the internal components managing the input/output voltage as well as being ready to balance the load if there's a power cut.The unit itself is pretty small and unobtrusive, it just weighs quite a bit for its size - which is probably just the weight of the batteries inside.I spent a lot of time looking for a suitable UPS and I'm really happy I chose this one. For the price it's great value, as I'm confident I'll get 30-45mins of run time if we have a power cut (based on another person's review and my initial tests). I'm powering a 24" Dell monitor, a mid-2010 Mac Pro tower and a vinyl cutter used to make stickers.The cold-start feature works well too - simply turn it on and you've got instant access to 240v, without it being turned on at the wall. When you simulate a power cut (turning the UPS off at the wall) the load instantly gets taken up by the UPS with zero latency.An issue with 90-degree UK IEC plugs: If you haven't got one already, you'll need to buy a multi-gang power cable/adaptor as the UPS doesn't come with one, so you won't be able to plug your computer in, etc. Make sure the gang socket cable doesn't have a 90-degree IEC plug, as the cable doesn't clear the ground/surface when it's plugged into the back of the UPS. The IEC cable needs to come straight out of the back of the UPS... hopefully that makes sense? See the photos I've included.Overall, though, If you're on the fence, definitely buy this UPS as it'll cover all of your needs if you need to have an 'insurance policy' for your computer equipment if you have a power cut.

UK power supply is NOT 220V, it is 240. This gadget regularly decides that the incoming voltage is too high and switches to a mode where it is down-scaling incoming voltage. That turns on the fan which is not anything like the spec-ed 45db. It is about 65 - loud, obnoxious and annoying.In addition to that, the USB connection regularly stalls and resets. As a result, most off-the shelf software will decide that that the UPS has gone dead and act on it (usually that means shutting the machine down). As far as the bundled software - sorry, it has to work with the stock one. That is why UPS HID was invented and that is why the UPS state machine and transitions are an official standard.Other than that - battery life, power usage reporting, voltage reporting are as expected. No complaints on basic functionality. The issues are just its distinct Europeanness and buggy USB.