While I try to not read Hacker News (especially comments) for various reasons, I still load it occasionally. I thankfully ran across a thread last night about this message forum post about a fire hazard with CyberPower Uninterruptible Power Supplies.
I was using CyberPower devices because I witnessed an APC Surge Suppressor catch fire while working around 2011 or so. The construction quality of that APC was really bad, so I went with the next brand on the list. But now, CyberPower is vulnerable? Gulp.
The result is I’ve powered down all my UPS’es and now have them out in the garage.
My solution? I don’t use a lot of laptops, so I’m going with Furman power conditioners (no batteries) across the board, and will just power down my desktop at night or when there’s an obvious thunderstorm coming. I’ve been using Furman power conditioners for years on my music equipment.
I’m not sure if any UPSes are actually “safe”, but apparently Furman was bought by Panamax, and I’ve yet to read anything bad about them. Maybe they are, maybe they aren’t. But I do worry about a lot of overseas electronics with poor safety standards, especially with large batteries attached.
While I mostly try to buy things on sites other than Amazon, my favorite Amazon review technique for consumer electronics is to read only the 1-star reviews and see which ones mention fires. If there’s even one, I won’t buy it.
What was particularly alarming about various threads on this subject were that many people were saying their CyberPower devices also caught fire (sometimes not just smoking either), and I recently detected one of mine smelling badly during a recent power outage and had disconnected it last week. So, probably a very close call with possibly the same reason for the problem.
It seems UPSes are not something you want in your house unattended, even if the risk per capita is low. If you decide to keep yours, it’s probably worth mentioning that the batteries also apparently need to be periodically replaced.