Make sure you're plugging in the important stuff - computer, monitor, external hard drives - into the correct outlets. One set is wired for battery backup and surge protection and the other set provides surge protection only. Most consumer UPSes have two sets of outlets on them.The upshot is not only does your computer get cleaner power, but if the power goes out the switchover to battery is much faster and smoother. What AVR does is constantly monitors the line voltage, and it not only suppresses spikes, but supplements even millisecond dips in the voltage (which can be more harmful than the spikes) with battery power to give you a nice smooth sine wave of AC power at the correct level. But when the power does go down, there's still a sizable gap (in computer time) between when the power goes out and when the UPS decides that it's time to switch over to the battery completely. This protects against gross spikes in the power and the power going away completely for a predetermined amount of time. A non-AVR UPS is basically just a battery backup with a good surge-protector built in. There's a substantial difference between these and regular UPSes. Look for the acronym AVR (Automatic Voltage Regulation) on the box when UPS shopping.If your configuration is in-between, I'd still recommend as high a capacity as you can afford - just for the extra runtime and load capacity for future growth. You might also consider getting an extra UPS for your other less-critical peripherals like scanners, inkjet printers, network hardware, etc. If you have a PowerMac Dual G5 2.7GHz with a large display and a couple of external hard drives, you'll need at least a 1KVA UPS - bigger if you need more than 10-15 minutes of on-battery runtime. Most G4 desktops will need 400-700VA, depending on the model and configuration. If all you have is a slot-loading iMac and an inkjet printer, you can probably get away with a 350VA model.
Without actually going into calculating wattage into load, here's a pretty easy guide. the lights flicker briefly) can potentially cause directory problems, data corruption or even hardware damage. Even fluctuations in power that are too quick for you to even notice (i.e. Given the potential anywhere for weather or an even minor glitch with your local power provider to cause havoc on your AC line, it really makes sense to protect your investment in your computer. I basically recommend that anyone who owns a comuter should get a UPS. The importance of a UPS might be a given for most of the folks who frequent this site, but a little UPS knowledge for those who don't know might be good to pass along. I did a search here on macosxhints and only found one hint related to UPSes - and it was mostly about using Tiger's Energy Saver preference pane to monitor them. I just recently bought a new Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) and got inspired to pass along the UPS litany I give my customers to a thread on Apple's Discussion forums.
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