Sola UPS 520RM 750
The Sola 520RM is remarkable amongst the units tested in that it was the only UPS to have standard Australian 10A power sockets on the rear, rather than female IEC-320 10A sockets. This makes plugging units in very easy, as you already have all the cables you need, rather than searching out IEC-320 10A male-to-female cables.
The front panel consists of an LED for AC in, which blinks when the UPS is bucking (reducing) or boosting (increasing) the input voltage. A second LED indicates whether the unit is operating on battery or not, and the remaining four LEDs indicate either the percentage battery charge or the percentage load on the unit. These LEDs also blink to alert you to alarm conditions.
The Sola 520 has a BestDock communications slot, which can accept an optional BestLink SNMP/Web adaptor (which was not supplied for testing).
The Sola UPS has a great expansion advantage; if you were to need more than the standard three power outlets, you could easily plug a power board into the UPS and run the devices from that. It is much more difficult to do that with an IEC-320 10A connector. Also on the rear of the unit is a network surge protector, which can be used to protect your equipment from a surge via your Ethernet cable. This is often used where Ethernet is run from another building, or another part of a building, and might be subject to a surge (eg, a lightning strike).
The CheckUPS II software supplied with the 520 does a good job of controlling the UPS, and has a very informative display, but it is missing a percentage charge indicator, which makes it difficult for us to tell when the batteries are fully charged. The tested battery life was an acceptable 50+ minutes, which means there is plenty of room for expansion. This also gave it the best running cost score of just AU$15.55 per minute.
| Product: | Sola UPS 520RM 750 |
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| Price: | AU$820 |
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| Vendor: | Invensys Energy Systems |
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| Phone: | 02 9878 5000 |
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| Web: | www.energy.invensys.com |
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| Interoperability: |
Good OS support, excellent software. |
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| Futureproofing: |
Hot-swap batteries, network module. |
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| ROI: |
Excellent value for money. |
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| Service: |
2-year warranty. |
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| Rating: |
Great system overall. |
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4%
4%
