Will a Simulated Sine Wave be an Issue? I heard that a Simulated Sine Wave UPS can be an issue for a PSU PC with a PFC on it. But my budget is only for a Simulated Sine Wave UPS.

If the lights go out, I wont game on it, but lets say the power did go out while gaming. I am consuming around 300 watts on my PC and now its on a Simulated Sine Wave and since the lights go out, I just simply turn off the game and turn offed my PC and wait for the power to come back.

Will that be an issue, like 30 secs of gaming cause of the exit transition and then properly shutting down my PC off? My PSU is a 80+ Gold 650 Watts.

And is a 1000VA/600W Enough Time to shut my PC down after gaming? my typical load is 300-400W in Hard Gaming

Thanks everyone! I am really scared that it will break the PC and I am not an electrical engineer

 

There was a comment made from Philippines that his PC had burned out. He said that in contending with brown outs and trying to keep his PC running that
the quality of the sine wave was a concern. I respect his comment, it is unfortunate that the grid is not working well, some are dealing with batteries and long extension cords,
The pc power supply has limitations. A constant and pure sine wave is desirable having lower harmonic content. There are filters that will improve the waveshape if needed.
A nice UPS is a conciderable investment, I have had power converters that were not sufficient and would not keep pc running when battery level dropped.
What I am saying is that harmonics are not a good thing for many applications causing loss in power transmission.

A laptop with Two or three new 18Vdc battery packs is simple and stays running when the grid quality becomes an obstacle.
A gaming laptop will do most everything however the graphics processor can draw more current.
A gaming interface with 7 inch screen, a terabyte of solid state drive come loaded with 80,000 games, controller, hdmi
is an alternative some are going with.

 

All sinewave inverters use a 'simulated' sine wave, and given that a laptop PSU is a off-line SMPS I think that it will be just fine running off such an inverter.

For many years my house and workshop ran using only sinewave-inverter power and I never had any problems whatsoever with all my computer equipment.

 

If, however, by 'simulated sine wave' you mean 'modified sine wave' then that is a very different matter, as modified sine-wave inverters can cause problems in various places ( eg particularly with inductors) and I could well imagine also with PF correction.

My advice is to avoid modified sine wave inverters and stick with pure sine wave, even with UPSs.

 

Consider that we do not have any statement as to what sort of computer the TS is using, except for the power draw. And the TS is already using a UPS with a "simulated sine wave" output, and apparently no problem so far. Given that information and no more, it seems to me that shutting down when the system experiences a power failure is a wise choice, rather than choosing to continue gaming while running on UPS power.
Of course, my situation has been possibly quite different, with the UPS providing the ability to save files and do an orderly shutdown when power failures happen. Saving files in process has always been the priority in my situation.

 

WRONG THREAD!!!
There has not been any mention about "surge suppression". This thread is about possible bad effects from the simulated sine wave. Totally different from surge issues.

 

Will a Simulated Sine Wave be an Issue? I heard that a Simulated Sine Wave UPS can be an issue for a PSU PC with a PFC on it. But my budget is only for a Simulated Sine Wave UPS.

If the lights go out, I wont game on it, but lets say the power did go out while gaming. I am consuming around 300 watts on my PC and now its on a Simulated Sine Wave and since the lights go out, I just simply turn off the game and turn offed my PC and wait for the power to come back.

Will that be an issue, like 30 secs of gaming cause of the exit transition and then properly shutting down my PC off? My PSU is a 80+ Gold 650 Watts.

And is a 1000VA/600W Enough Time to shut my PC down after gaming? my typical load is 300-400W in Hard Gaming

Thanks everyone! I am really scared that it will break the PC and I am not an electrical engineer



If you’re looking into real money gaming mechanics or just curious how similar systems work in actual online pokies, this full review breaks down how real money pokies operate - including things like RTP, bonus features, and how timing can affect outcomes. Might give you some extra ideas for your setup!

You’ll probably be fine for quick shutdowns, especially if you’re not gaming once the power drops. I’ve used a sim sine wave UPS with active PFC PSUs before, and never had a problem as long as I shut down within a minute or so. Just don’t push it too long or overload it.

 

Why would a switched mode supply prefer a pure sinewave? There's nothing pure about it when it is rectified - it's full of harmonics. What it needs is DC preferably with as little ripple as possible. For that wouldn't a flat-topped waveform be better?

 

An interesting quasi-sinewave that's easily generated is a square-wave with 0V dead-time equal to the positive and negative peak voltage time.
It thus has the RMS value of a sine-wave with the same peak value.
This means it generates the correct voltage/power for both a resistive load, and a load sensitive to the peak voltage, such as the peak rectified input to a switching regulator.

Edit: Another interesting observation--
A transformer's peak magnetizing current is actually about 20% less for the quasi waveform since that current is determined by the average, not the RMS voltage of the waveforms, and the average (half-cycle) voltage of the quasi wave is 0.5 of the peak, whereas the sinewave is 0.637 of the peak.
This means you could conceivably use a 60Hz transformer on 50Hz without overheating if powered by this quasi wave.
Possibly also a 60Hz motor, but they can have more losses from the square-wave harmonics.

(Sim Example Below):

 

Will a Simulated Sine Wave be an Issue? I heard that a Simulated Sine Wave UPS can be an issue for a PSU PC with a PFC on it. But my budget is only for a Simulated Sine Wave UPS.

If the lights go out, I wont game on it, but lets say the power did go out while gaming. I am consuming around 300 watts on my PC and now its on a Simulated Sine Wave and since the lights go out, I just simply turn off the game and turn offed my PC and wait for the power to come back.

Will that be an issue, like 30 secs of gaming cause of the exit transition and then properly shutting down my PC off? My PSU is a 80+ Gold 650 Watts.

And is a 1000VA/600W Enough Time to shut my PC down after gaming? my typical load is 300-400W in Hard Gaming

Thanks everyone! I am really scared that it will break the PC and I am not an electrical engineer

Hello,

The main thing that bothered me about simulated sine wave UPS systems was that the definitions are not explained well at all.
If you look up a simulated sine wave, it could say it is a 'stepped' wave, which is not true in general. A stepped wave can be decent because it will provide any power supply with a voltage that gradually increases step by step. The truth is, it's not stepped unless you consider a step from 0 to maximum to be 'stepped'. I don't because I've seen stepped sine waves and they have more than one step.
The ones they sell today seem to have one step to max positive, then zero, then one step to max negative, then zero, then repeat. That's just a rectangular wave.
These are not recommended for power supplies that use active PFC because an active PFC is not ready for that kind of input source. It can cause various problems like unexpected shutdown and even hardware damage.

You can get a pure sine UPS for around $200 USD, but maybe as low as $150. A simulated sine would be around half of those which is not really a huge difference. You should only have to buy it one time only.

As far as run time, it goes by the size of the battery AND the load. If you have a 12v 7AHr batter powering 400 watts, it will have to draw at least 34 amps. With 7AHr that means the max run time will be about 12 minutes, but figure half of that which is 6 minutes. That's plenty of time to shut down IF you are at the computer at all times. If you aren't then it may shut down without you noticing after the 6 minutes runs out.
Also, if you can stop the game from running that will ease up on the power draw giving you more time.
You might also noticed that some manufacturers give run times for half and full loads. That's when the battery is brand new.

After all is said and done, I'd go with a pure sine converter UPS if the computer is worth the enough money. If you can't buy a new computer, then you really have to go with a pure sine UPS. You could also get more features with that too which might include auto shutdown during a power failure, but it's a gentle shutdown not a sudden removal of line power.

 

The terminology I'm familiar with is "Pure sinewave" (self explanatory) and "modified sinewave" which is the 325V peak 230V rms rectangular wave as described by @crutschow . "Simulated sinewave" is not a term I've come across.
Of the PFC controller ICs I am familiar with, they are usually continuous-current types or boundary-mode types, boundary mode tends to be the cheaper so probably the most common. These work by switching on the MOSFET for a fixed time, so the energy transferred is proportional to the integral of the input voltage over the on-time. They don't give a damn about the shape of the waveform.
Has anyone actually measured what happens when a PFC circuit is connected to a "modified" sinewave? I've tested them with 216V DC, and they cope with that perfectly well, but I've never had a "modified" sinewave inverter in the workshop to try them on.

 

These are not recommended for power supplies that use active PFC

Do you have a good reference for that statement or is it just conjecture?

 

My read on UPS units is they will give you a MSW (Modified Sine Wave) which looks exactly like crutschow posted in Post #9 or a TSW (True Sine Wave). The latter TSW UPS does carry a higher cost. Before the TSW versions were readily available I did fine with the MSW versions. None of the home computers cared and ran just fine. Today I use the TSW versions and even then I have whole house backup power so within about 1.0 min I have back the equivalent of mains power. If what you have and I assume MSW it should be fine.

Ron

 

I have one of those "modified sine wave" UPS devices. It clearly states "for computers only" in large clear letters. It also states that it may damage other kinds of equipment.
When that sort of warning is given so clearly, I would tend to accept it.

 

Just about anything with a old school induction motor/drive or highly reactive load won't like MSW (Modified Sine Wave), but today, almost everything has gone BLDC or switching PS. The input AC power is converted to DC first so MSW is much less of an issue it once was. Today direct digital synthesis of the AC output from a DC link voltage is cheaper than a heavy utility transformer.

 

Once melted an AC fan with a "modified sine wave" inverter, I think it was a Shaded-Pole Induction Motor.
The huge harmonic content caused large eddy current losses, heating the fan way over temp?
Does this sound like the correct explanation for why the fan died?

 

Once melted an AC fan with a "modified sine wave" inverter, I think it was a Shaded-Pole Induction Motor.
The huge harmonic content caused large eddy current losses, heating the fan way over temp?
Does this sound like the correct explanation for why the fan died?

Hi,

Yes, with a modern fan the thermal fuse would blow. That can be replaced. You have to find the right one though.

 

This is more about economics than engineering. You could design a really good, robust, modified sinewave inverter, but it would cost more than the cheaper true-sine-wave inverters, so who would buy it?
That means that most modified sinewave inverters are, by the laws of economics, junk.

 

The terminology I'm familiar with is "Pure sinewave" (self explanatory) and "modified sinewave" which is the 325V peak 230V rms rectangular wave as described by @crutschow . "Simulated sinewave" is not a term I've come across.
Of the PFC controller ICs I am familiar with, they are usually continuous-current types or boundary-mode types, boundary mode tends to be the cheaper so probably the most common. These work by switching on the MOSFET for a fixed time, so the energy transferred is proportional to the integral of the input voltage over the on-time. They don't give a damn about the shape of the waveform.
Has anyone actually measured what happens when a PFC circuit is connected to a "modified" sinewave? I've tested them with 216V DC, and they cope with that perfectly well, but I've never had a "modified" sinewave inverter in the workshop to try them on.

Hi,

I ran into the 'new' terminology just recently, more or less. They may say simulated sinewave because it may sound better to buyers. This was in the past few months.
Before that I only remember seeing 'modified sinewave', but it is the same thing and I proved it because I purchased one to test, and I even have the waveforms as I took a photo of the scope screen. It's just one pulse positive a zero period, then one pulse negative, then zero period again, then repeats that pattern. There is no time when it reaches say 1/2 of the full value of the positive pulse or negative pulse.

This is unfortunate, but it only works with certain types of loads and does not work well with others, and unfortunately there are so many different circuits out there there's almost no way to be sure it will work with a given device unless we know the internals of the device to be powered.
There are even a lot of different designs for an Active PFC, so it is possible one APFC will work while another one will not.
The complains range from device failure to computers shutting down when the mains power goes out and the UPS tries to power the computer (with the APFC) from its internal converter. There apparently is a gap in power which makes the computer shut down suddenly as if there was no UPS.

 

My read on UPS units is they will give you a MSW (Modified Sine Wave) which looks exactly like crutschow posted in Post #9 or a TSW (True Sine Wave). The latter TSW UPS does carry a higher cost. Before the TSW versions were readily available I did fine with the MSW versions. None of the home computers cared and ran just fine. Today I use the TSW versions and even then I have whole house backup power so within about 1.0 min I have back the equivalent of mains power. If what you have and I assume MSW it should be fine.

Ron

Hi Ron,

I've read complaints that devices are damaged and computers shut down. The main problem seems to be the computer shuts down, but that's when the mains power goes out suddenly and the UPS tries to power the computer.

It depends a lot on the computer though. If it has an Active PFC circuit, then it may shut down during a sudden mains power outage which does not give us enough time to shut down gently. There are so many types of APFC circuits though that there could be some that work ok.
I have to wonder now if UPS manufacturers are taking this into account in order to allow them to function with loads that have APFC.