Most people do not notice any problems with the electrical power in their office or house unless there is a complete outage. But really, there are several conditions that can have catastrophic impact on sensitive electronics. These are:
Brown Outs – These are similar to power sags but last for extended periods of time. Lower power can actually cause more damage than spike or surges. Most systems have breakers or fuses to protect against spikes or surges, but low power is not always accounted for in system design. Often brown outs can cause hard drives to crash and data read and write errors which corrupt data. UPS’s maintain a constant voltage level during brown outs by drawing from their battery.
Power Surge – These often happen when power is restored, but also can happen when heavy power draws are suddenly stopped (like when the A/C compressor shuts off). The abundance of power on the line causes a temporary surge in power that can overload sensitive circuits and components. Lightning strikes or atmospheric static discharge on windy days can also cause this.
Power Sags – These are typically short length drops in power in the office. These can be caused by heavy equipment (compressors, grinders, A/C units) suddenly being turned on. You may notice the lights in the office flicker or wink for a moment. Power sags can also be accompanied by power surges as the grid tries to compensate for the drop or as the load is turned off.
Blackout – These are obvious to just about everyone. The power goes completely out. Unfortunately, this never happens cleanly. There are usually micro sags and micro surges prior to the complete loss of power. When the power suddenly goes out, any hard drives that are writing may experience head crashes (where the tiny electromagnet hovering micrometers over the platter touches the platter and scratches the magnetic coating and introduces fragments into the air around the disk leading to future failures).
At Yum Technology, we trust APC equipment for protection. They have been the leaders in the industry for years (maybe decades). For example, our servers in our packages come with APC Power Backup (UPS) units to protect them. APC offers outstanding protection and warranties against damage caused by power issues. I rarely trust anyone else.
