Power protection of critical equipment is at the highest priority for all organizations and work from home applications. Providing the uninterrupted power to critical equipment like desktop, laptop and internet router is the most important for organizations. In the post Covid era most companies are providing the option for employees to work from home, or have adopted a hybrid working model. Organizations are also making sure employees have the right equipment, connectivity and uninterrupted power for seamless online meetings and better productivity of the employees. Even though the latest laptops provide sufficient backups, the internet routers need uninterrupted power supplies to have seamless meetings and discussions over video calls or online meetings. People who are supporting the customers, especially, cannot afford to have slight disruption in power for their internet connectivity. Hence, UPS is an integral part of the whole working from home solutions.
There are different aspects we need to look at when designing work from home solutions. A major aspect is the safety of employees and their families. There will be small kids playing at home and may come near the UPS and power equipment. This is extremely dangerous. Unfortunately, the most unsafe element in the overall solution is power equipment like UPS. The power equipment, especially UPS, should be designed in such a way that there are no live wires hanging here and there which can cause hazardous incidents.
Another aspect of work from home solution is the overall footprint. Every employee may not have the luxury of the separate home office or large working space at home to perform their job. Hence the overall work from solution should be designed in such a way that it occupies minimum working space. For metro cities, where power cuts are very minimal, we can have smaller UPS like Vertiv ITON 600VA or Vertiv ITON 1000 VA. These are line interactive UPS from Vertiv family which gives decent backup and performance at the smaller footprint. The real challenge comes at the rural areas of India or Class B/C/D cities where the power interruptions and load shedding are longer durations. Here the UPS solution needs to provide backup for anywhere between 30 minutes to 4 hours. This is a real challenge. For any UPS to provide larger backup to this level of duration, UPS solution should accommodate higher rating and higher number of batteries. Typically, smaller range UPS like 600VA or 1000VA can accommodate one or two 7AH or 9 AH batteries which will not be enough for providing higher backup time. If we go with generic solutions with external higher AH batteries, solutions become unsafe due to batteries placed outside UPS and battery cables or wires hanging outside. Also, separate battery rack is needed and takes more space. This solution becomes unsuitable for work home solution. Good news is, there are offline UPS, ITON , from Vertiv family which comes with 26AH/42AH/65AH battery inbuilt in the UPS, which can give higher backup time as required. This solution is safe for the home environment as well as occupies very less space.
Vertiv ITON series have various products with inbuilt battery solution with the varied requirement of backup. These UPS are very safe for home application and take the lesser footprint.
