"Uninterruptible Power Supply"

Spring in Illinois is notorious for thunderstorms and bad weather. This is one time of year we take special note of protecting the Cornerstone equipment at your site. This is why each one of the sites is equipped with a UPS unit.

Q: What is the UPS unit and what does it do?

UPS is an acronym for Un-interruptible Power Supply. As the name implies it is made to provide un-interrupted power when the regular power goes out.

The UPS unit is located in the server room and provides battery backup to your server and network equipment in the event of a power outage. The server, switch, router and modem should be plugged into the UPS. This battery power will keep your equipment on line an estimated 30 minutes. This will provide enough time for you to call the Cornerstone Call Center and have them assist in the shutdown of your equipment. The UPS has been designed to shutdown your server in a controlled manner to avoid problems with data corruption. After the batteries have almost discharged completely the Powerchute program begins normal shutdown procedures for your server. The UPS will usually start beeping at this point. After the server shuts down it will stay down until the utility power is restored. When the power has been restored the UPS batteries will begin to re-charge. Then the Powerchute program will start the server and begin reloading the network and backup software. In most cases the server will restart completely. Sometimes, however, it will require some additional assistance to return to full service. In either case, you should call and report the power outage to the Call Center. Do not allow users to log into the Cornerstone application until all hardware and data have been checked.

Remember, if you hear a beeping sound coming from the server area it will most likely be the UPS unit warning the batteries are discharging. Report this to the Call Center immediately so a Cornerstone Network Support tech can check your UPS and server for problems. Nightly inspection of the UPS unit will assist in preventing major problems. If the red replace battery LED is lit on your UPS, call and open a ticket for the UPS to be replaced. Also check the battery charge bar, the 5 LED display on the right side of the front panel of the UPS. When all 5 lights are lit, the battery is fully charged and operating normally. Report any instances of the battery charge at 20% to the Call Center for monitoring.

Your assistance in checking the UPS will ensure the best protection against data corruption. Along with the nightly rotation of backup tapes and successful completion of BODs and EODs, recovery of data will be possible in the event of a disaster.