for a while now, i’ve been grabbing cheap used ups boxes to run my home servers off of. problem is, they are just about useless. i can run an old p2 (no monitor!) off of one for about 5 minutes before it fails. even if i were to chain a few of them together, the puny sla batteries in them typically go dead a month or two after i buy them anyway. consequently, i’ve been going through them like candy.
searching for a solution, i came across this article for building a diy ups. with an inverter, a power supply or charger, and a car battery you can have yourself a pretty solid dual conversion ups that is expandable to meet your downtime needs. it’s worth a read even if you just want to know how a proper ups works.
