Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Smoke, electronics, and a good experience
Last Friday, my 2-month old battery backup UPS decided to die. We had a brown out (just enough to dim the lights in the room) and the UPS to switched to battery backup mode. My computer was hooked up to it, and at first things were just fine.
But then my computer lost power and rebooted: precisely what the UPS is supposed to prevent. So I looked under the desk at the UPS and noticed it was making a strange buzzing noise, which was then followed by the release of some nasty, smelly, smoke.
I quickly powered off the UPS, and opened the windows around the house to try to air the place out. I'm guessing something short circuited in the UPS... electrical arching and melting wires do not smell nice.
I called Dell where I bought the UPS (after calling 3 different numbers each time being informed I needed to call elsewhere) , and was told that because the unit was over one month old it was not their problem. So I called the manufacturer APC told them my smoking story. Within minutes they located stock at their Canadian warehouse and had a new unit shipped out. I received it on Monday.
They'll be mailing me tags for me to ship the faulty unit back. I guess some companies still understand the need to keep customers happy. I'm impressed.
But then my computer lost power and rebooted: precisely what the UPS is supposed to prevent. So I looked under the desk at the UPS and noticed it was making a strange buzzing noise, which was then followed by the release of some nasty, smelly, smoke.
I quickly powered off the UPS, and opened the windows around the house to try to air the place out. I'm guessing something short circuited in the UPS... electrical arching and melting wires do not smell nice.
I called Dell where I bought the UPS (after calling 3 different numbers each time being informed I needed to call elsewhere) , and was told that because the unit was over one month old it was not their problem. So I called the manufacturer APC told them my smoking story. Within minutes they located stock at their Canadian warehouse and had a new unit shipped out. I received it on Monday.
They'll be mailing me tags for me to ship the faulty unit back. I guess some companies still understand the need to keep customers happy. I'm impressed.
Labels: gadgets
posted by Wayne at 11:45 PM |
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