Battery Backup Systems
Battery Backup Systems – Protect Your Data
It was a busy day for Margaret. Working remotely from home, she had spent the last 9 hours crafting advertisements for her company’s advertising campaign and was just about to upload them to their server when the power was cut out! She thought she had saved the large file, containing hours of work, and she did – but unfortunately didn’t save often enough and she lost over half her work, hours of effort. It was a beautiful day outside, there couldn’t have been any electrical storms, and there wasn’t an accident that downed power lines…so what happened? Without battery backup systems in place, this horrible story could be yours.
For most of us, a power outage is not a huge deal. A video game can be played again. A phone conversation can continue later, or, be made on a cell phone. The refrigerator without power is only a big deal if the outage continues for more than a day or so. But your data is the most significant loss you could face if you lose power suddenly. Data is instantly wiped from existence if it’s not saved. Adding the security of battery backup systems to your computer or network is paramount in the workplace. In Margaret’s case, that workplace was her home – and she didn’t even think about electrical surges being a problem there!
“I knew my workplace had all the appropriate battery backup systems installed,” she wrote, “but once I stopped going to the office and started working from my kitchen, I didn’t stop to think that I should have one, too! Now I have lost a day’s worth of data because of a freak electrical surge that overloaded my circuit breaker for the receptacle outlets in my home!”
Electrical surges can happen at any time, and instantly overburden one or many circuits in your home. The electrical current in the United States is an oscillating current which gets transferred to a more steady 120 volts. But the power lines on the street are much higher than this voltage, and a switch in the electrical grid could trigger a surge which could in turn, end up at the receptacle end of your PC. Other types of surges are much smaller and do no immediate harm; over time these repeated tiny surges eat away at your hardware and can eventually lead to your PC malfunctioning.
Having a surge protector is an excellent barrier against these surges. However, they still will not protect your actual data. Because when the power goes out, or a breaker trips, and your PC shuts down – guess where your work goes. It dissolves. Battery backup systems prevent all of this because while the surge protector provides a buffer against electrical damage, the battery backup allows your equipment to operate under a power-loss event such as a lightning strike, power line snapping, or electrical surge. This gives you enough time to save your work, and with some battery backup systems it even allows you to continue working. Some systems have longer battery time than others. A personal computer uses a lot of energy, however, so be sure to install the included software that came with the system. This software will be able to tell you how much battery time you have left, and on some models, will automatically save any open applications for you.
Margaret had to work late into the night to finish her work, that she had actually already completed earlier in the day. “Think of all the free time I could have had, if I had only taken the time to research battery backup systems and choose the right one for my needs.” She said.