Check your email during a blackout

Last night, something really cool happened. A storm blew through the greater Indianapolis area and knocked out the power in my house.

No, that wasn't the cool part.

The cool part was that I was able to catch up on my email for nearly an hour after the power went out using my laptop and my home Internet connection.

Ok, so the laptop part is pretty easy to figure out. It has an internal battery and can probably run for 4-5 hours on its own before needing a recharge. The trickier part to figure out is how I was able to keep my cable modem and wireless router powered during the blackout. They don't have internal batteries.

How I did it

Right now, any techie reading this is shouting, "Ooh, ooh, pick me! Pick me! I know, I know!" That's because the techies know I used what is referred to as a UPS. And no, I'm not referring to the UPS delivery service I mentioned two days ago.

Rather, I'm referring to an uninterruptable power supply. That's a mouthful that means my cable modem and wireless router were plugged into a device that contains a battery. Under normal conditions my cable modem and wireless router draw power from the electrical outlet just like any other electronic device. But the magic in a UPS is that it automatically switches the power to battery during a power failure for every device connected to it.

How many devices you connect makes a difference

I should note that I have a fairly inexpensive UPS (the $90 variety, they can easily creep up to several hundred for some home models) which I use to power my computer, monitor, cable modem and wireless router. Under normal conditions, my UPS can keep these devices powered on battery for about 10 minutes.

So how did I get over an hour? Simple. I was home when the power went out so I walked over to my computer, powered it down, and then turned off the monitor. That left the cable modem and wireless router as the only two devices drawing battery power from the UPS. And since, the cable modem and wireless router draw far less power than my computer I was able to squeeze a lot more time out of the UPS battery.

Now, the point of this blog post isn't really to brag about how I was able to check email for over an hour during a blackout (although I still think that's pretty cool). It was more to inform noobies on what a UPS is and why you might want one. But don't buy one so you can check email during a blackout. Buy one to protect your electronic devices and to give yourself a few extra minutes to save any un-saved documents on your computer and gracefully power it down when the power does go out unexpectedly.

Shameless plug alert!

And remember, if you need assistance picking out and installing a UPS for your home or office, Noobie can help.