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Comment by justinclift | Hacker News Reader

As a side note with UPS's, it can somewhat informative to look at the pricing for their replacement batteries.

At least here in Australia, replacement batteries for some of the common UPS's (for desktop usage) cost nearly as much as the UPS itself.

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From my own adventure in this area, the battery is very standard and IMO reasonably priced. What gets expensive is shipping it, since lead is so heavy. I remember having trouble finding local sellers for them that would have avoided the shipping cost.

I've found home security companies to be a good source, either of the batteries themselves or at least a local supplier who can get what you need.

Also consider how the size of the UPS affects the battery replacement cost. I purchased my most recent UPS, refurbished by CyberPower, from its eBay store <https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_ssn=cyberpower>. For a few dollars more I could have bought a larger size, but

* I didn't need more capacity (the one I bought will power the server it serves for an hour, far more time than I need or want) and, more to the point,

* The larger-size model has two batteries to replace, significantly increasing the cost.

I wish the battery layout/ amp hours was more obvious in UPS sales listings. The watts/VA are always front and center, but generally I want to know runtime which is harder to find and compare.

I never buy APC replacement batteries - third party batteries are much cheaper, and seem to work just as well based on testing by the UPS itself.

Also these brands are just using off the shelf batteries anyway (eg: a Cyberpower model using two 12v/8Ah SLA batteries connected together[1], with various OEM brands seen on the labels). Searching online discussions one finds which OEMs make better quality batteries.

[1] One such example, replacing with a generic kind: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6qcon76i4s

For what it's worth, I was gifted one of these. A replacement battery was $45 from Jaycar.

Com port is a standard USB-B port and is compatible with but

https://www.telephonewreckers.com.au/power-shield-safeguard-...

My only complaint is the formfactor is about weird.

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