At Mon, 07 Nov 2011 09:55:35 -0500 David Korpiewski <davidk at cs.umass.edu> wrote: > > ** Be sure to fill out the survey/skills inventory in the member's area. > ** If you did, we all thank you. > > > I was wondering if anyone out there could help me select a generator > that would run one floor of an office (about 20 computers and 4 > servers). I have heard that a generic generator that you'd buy from > Home Depot isn't optimal for computers, and from my own experience, it > tends to burn up my APC UPS units if I leave them turned on when the > generator is going. > > So I was wondering if anyone had experience with computer class > generators, ideally ones that start themselves and are pushing probably > 10000 watts or more? All I know is that probably want one of the propane fired ones. I unserstand that gasoline does not store well, but that propane does. I don't know if the sort of automatic propane power generators meant for building emergency backup power (such as the Town Of Wendell has for the town buildings) will work for you. I suspect yes. It might not be cheap though and might be overkill. When I was working at UMass, we had this humvee that was part of an 'atomimious vehicle' project that had a diesel powered generator to power the on-board computer systems and that seemed to work OK, but that is probably not want you are looking for. (I think it has a 2 cylinder engine.) I would suspect that a well made very smooth running generator is what you want. Smooth running == 2 or 4 cylinders. The typical little generators 'you get a Home Depot' have just a single cylinder lawn mower engine -- this is likely fine for power tools at a construction site and such like situations (which is what these machines are meant for) -- the AC/DC motors in typical power tools are very tolerant of their power source and are generally tough little motors designed to take all kinds of 'abuse'. > > Thank you kindly > David > > > > -- Robert Heller -- 978-544-6933 / heller at deepsoft.com Deepwoods Software -- http://www.deepsoft.com/ () ascii ribbon campaign -- against html e-mail /\ www.asciiribbon.org -- against proprietary attachments