APC Tracker 4 is a Cocoa application for UPS devices in a network that powers specifically off Mac OS X and Xserve. It investigates the status of the UPS and will properly shut down the client. Jul 04, 2020  APC UPS, 1500VA UPS Battery Backup & Surge Protector, BX1500M Backup Battery, AVR, Dataline Protection. (NEMA 5-15P), and FREE Windows PC power-management software (Mac OS.

Isn't that menu item for laptops?
Why would you think it was for a UPS?

I have a Belkin UPS and this seems to work just fine. When you open the Energy Saver System Pref the 'Settings for:' drop-down lists a UPS there. You can, via these controls, control when the system safely shuts down in times of power-failure.
I hit the test button on my UPS and the battery level indicator in the menu bar dropped down and it then allowed me to see how long my desktop would run with the UPS. Nice. Simple. Seamless.

Which Belkin UPS model do you use?

I just bought a Belkin F6C800 800VA UPS, which was on sale at CompUSA for $50 after rebate. I plugged in the USB cable, and the Energy Saver preferences (10.3.4) panel grew a UPS settings popup. In addition to the usual Sleep settings, there were new options for auto-shutdown on the UPS.
This is without installing any additional software.

That button on the front of mine wasn't the 'test' button. :-(
LOL!

Why would I think it was for a UPS?
Because, I noticed UPS graphics inside it. Because I noticed drivers for USB UPSes, and put two and two together.
Because it works?

You wrote:
'-I've just bought a new APC UPS for my PowerMac G4. It ships with PowerChute software, but versiontracker.com comments suggest it is not yet Panther compatible'
My APC Back-UPS 500 and its PowerChute software work just fine in Panther. No problems whatsoever.

Does anyone happen to know if one can connect a UPS to an unused USB port on an Apple keyboard? I need a USB hub, I know, but don't have one yet, and would like to be able to use the UPS in the meantime.

Yes, the Apple keyboard is a USB hub, it just doesn't have many ports. If you are looking for a USB hub you might try looking at Free After Rebate they have them from time to time. It'll cost you shipping though (unless you manage to find enough free items all in one place to qualify for free shipping!). Good luck.

Thanks for the rebate link; I'll check that out.

Slightly defensively, yes, the Apple keyboard is a USB hub, but I was wondering if there are any issues the way (Apple claims) there are with running Apple speakers through -- the keyboard doesn't support whatever the audio-over-USB spec is.

So: Is there some kind of funky UPS-over-USB functionality that most Apple keyboards don't provide? Or am I just worrying about nothing?

APC say you should plug their UPSes directly into a USB port on the computer, rather than though a hub.
I'm not sure why.. Perhaps it's to ensure you're not plugging it in through an unprotected mains-powered USB hub. /spotify-app-not-working-mac.html. Or maybe there's another reason.. Try it and see what happens.

I've never been certain why APC says one should plug the UPS directly into the computer instead of a USB hub. I suspect there is some obscure technical reason; but hypothetically there is no reason why you couldn't plug in the UPS via a hub, as long as the hub is itself plugged into the Battery Backup side of the UPS.
I ran tests just last night, pulling the plug on the UPS unit: battery power kicked in instantly and the PowerChute software displayed an alert box a few seconds after that. The software also 'gracefully' shut down my computer when the battery reached the limit I had set in the software preferences. I successfully repeated this test several times.
So, it appears that the UPS unit does indeed function just fine through a (powered) USB hub when power is cut; and the PowerChute software also kicks in just fine if you're running it, even though APC says it is not fully compatible (what in particular is not fully compatible about the software, I don't know).
Incidentally, I have a Backups Pro 500, which has my 533 MHz G4, a 19' CRT monitor, an Aiport Extreme Base Station, and a 4-port USB hub plugged in to the Battery Backup side. The UPS's USB cable is plugged into that hub.

The USB hub in the keyboard is a passive device. It is powered by the computer. It has no power supply of it's own. Therefore the keyboard (and usually the mouse since people usually plug it in to the keyboard) derive their power from this hub. There is little power left. I would recommend not plugging anything into the keyboard hub unless it is a self-powered (active) USB hub.
When selecting a USB hub, chose one that comes with a power adapter.

I checked this out here: I have a Cube connected to an APC BackUPS, and a Powerbook (which is not connected to a UPS, of course). It looks like the EnergySaver pref panel does not show any 'Settings for' menu for a desktop computer, just for the Powerbook. Therefore, my Cube doesn't have access to any UPS options in my EnergySaver pref panel. Bummer.
Regarding software for UPSs, I switched to PowerGuardian, a 3rd party solution. Gives more robust control than the PowerChute software that comes with the APC units.

Did you try the Menu extra?
I don't have any additional options in my Energy Saver preferences, but the menu works anyway.

It's VAGUELY possible you can actually gain that functionality from your PowerBook. I know for a fact that if you (incautiously) clone your boot drive from a desktop to a laptop that it will clobber the special laptop-only features of Energy Saver. Henceforth (until you fix it) your laptop Energy Saver panel will only have the features of the desktop version. For this reason CCC (Carbon Copy Cloner) excludes the Energy Saver prefs file by default.
What this tells me is that these battery-related features are probably simply something in the XML prefs file for Energy Saver, present when installed on laptops and left off when installed to desktop Macs, and not a special function of the binary itself.
Ergo, in theory you should be able to copy your E.S. prefs file from the laptop to the desktop and get those features. If that fails, copying ALL of E.S. from the laptop to the desktop might do the trick.
If someone has a laptop and is reading this, please post your E.S. prefs file (don't forget the [CODE] markup!), and I'll be happy to test it. I have a desktop and a UPS I just acquired, but no laptop. I don't check here every single day, so if you do post the file here, please let me know at mech the 'at sign' goes here well.com

The APC software works fine in Panter. Just remember, if you use a USB hub, make sure its also plugged into the UPS. If the hub looses power your Mac will loose connection to the UPS and not shutdown.

It's L-O-S-E! Lose! I know it's funny-looking, but that's the way it is. Language police over and out. Please return to your regularly scheduled program.
---

slur was here

This feature works perfectly for me on my iMac. The menu item shows me the percent charged, and when I unplugged the UPS from the wall menu item also showed me the percent remaining on the battery. For me, this is much easier than using the Powerchute software. I wonder if my iMac will automatically go to sleep when the battery gets too low... I'd rather not have to test that myself.

I have an APC UPS, and all I get is the second Charged in the menu. (Actually, was wondering where that second 'Charged' came from :-)
Nowhere can I see it affecting anything else (like in the Energy Saver control panel).
Mine is a APC Back-UPS ES 725 hooked up through a USB Ultra Hub 4 to a Powerbook G3 (2000). Eliminating the hub has no effect.

Just a guess here, but your Powerbook battery is one battery and your UPS is the second one maybe.????

Yep, that's exactly it. In fact I noticed this a while ago when I plugged my UPS into my iBook. I even submitted the hint, but it wasn't posted.

I first noticed this behavior after upgrading my TiBook (667 DVI) to 10.3. Energy saver actually allows me to configure the UPS's settings and gives me an estimated run time of 30 min off an APC 500.

Now if i could find software for my Energizer UPS..

Thanks. Works just as described with my ~2.5 year old Belkin UPS. Sorry, I can't remember the model number, 650 maybe?
Fwiw, with 97% charge as reported by the battery menu item, I get about 3 minutes of uptime if I unplug the UPC. That's while running a DP G5 with a 20' Cinema display, DSL modem, firewall/router and airport base station. Yikes! That's not much, but enough for my purposes. My power outages are usually either seconds long or days. haha.
Rob

This reminds me of MacHack in Dearborn a few years back, like 1998 or so.
One of the 'hacks' displayed was a series of big batteries -- car or motorcycle batteries -- on a rolling luggage cart from the hotel.
Wired to this was a tower G3 with a hacked around driver so the battery status (meant for powerbooks) would display the remaining charge. Everyone loved it.
Makes you wonder..

Iso image software free mac. I have a Power Mac G4 (Digital Audio). I also have a Back-UPS ES 725BB, and I never connected the USB cable or installed PowerChute. I tried this hint, and it works as advertised. The battery icon in the menu bar is a vertical rectangle (instead of the horizontally-oriented cylindrical battery icon that portables have). It has a little lightning bolt through it. For time, it says 'unknown until full' even though the percent says '100%'. I would go ahead and unplug it from the wall, but I can't reach the plug since it's inaccessible behind my desk.
Mr. Spleen

I don't know what all this nonsense is about. I plugged in my APC LS500 and the battery menu simply appeared, along with new settings in Energy Saver for 'Power adapter' and 'UPS' (where 'Battery' would be if this were my Powerbook). I didn't have to do anything special, it just worked.
It may have something to do with the model of UPS. But there doesn't seem to be anything even remotely hackish about it. There are options for reducing energy consumption while on battery, in addition for specifying the point at which to shutdown the machine when just a few minutes of battery power remain.
The only problem I have is that the battery menu insists that the charge level is 'Unknown until full.' That's what I'm out to troubleshoot..

Did you figure out the 'Unknown until full' charge level issue? I see the same on my eMac with an APC Back-UPS ES 725. Otherwise everything works fine and I don't have any reason to install PowerChute. I modified the /usr/libexec/upsshutdown script, commenting-out the server stuff and adding 'killall' commands.

Running System -> Library -> CoreServices -> Menu Extras was all it took to add the menu bar item and activate the UPS features in the Energy Saver panel. Unlocking the panel and selecting the 'Settings for' pulldown let me configure separate energy saver settings for 'Power Adaptor' and 'UPS' modes. A help popup around the 'Shutdown when only X minutes..' checkbox even tells me that I can add a special UPS-related shutdown script in /usr/libexec/ups-shutdown.
Thank you for the very nice Hint!

The /usr/libexec/upsshutdown script is really intended for OS X Server. And there's a typo on the logger line; '.ermerg' should be '.emerg'.

How do I remove the battery icon from the menu bar? I tried this hint, but my UPS has a serial connector, now I want to delete the battery icon.

Is working on 10.3.8 with APC XS 1000 on my dual 2.0 PowerMac. The energy saver menu opens and the 'Settings for' selection includes an option to configure computer/display sleep times for 'UPS'. I never even inserted the CD from the APC folks. The 'Energy Saver' dialog also includes a checkbox for 'Show UPS Status in the menu bar'.
I'll quiesce the system and try-out the UPS after the batteries have a chance to charge (before dumping the dual 2.0 on them :-).
Thanks for a really great tip!
JimC

Yes, it passes my simple 'pull the plug' test using OS/X 10.3.8 on my dual 2.0 gHz Powermac with an APC XS 1000 UPS. Here's what happened:
1. I had previously configured the UPS status display on the menu bar to show 'percentage' and 'Shutdown when only' 10 'minutes of UPS power are remaining.'
2. I quiesced the system (quitting all my aps, waiting and manually syncing my mirrored disks).
3. After about 4 hours of charging, I pulled the UPS plug.
4. The UPS alarm sounded and OS/X displayed a dialog that warned me that the system was operating from battery power. The lighening bolt in the UPS battery icon was replaced by a solid bar.
5. The UPS icon's 'percentage' indicator began to drop rapidly from 100%, getting down to 92% in a matter of a few minutes (given only 4 hours of charging). The dual G5 sucks the life out of a 1000VA UPS.
6. I plugged the UPS back in. The noisy UPS alarm quit sounding and the OS/X dialog disappeared from my screen. The UPS battery indicator began to climb back towards 100%.
Pretty cool. We owe someone at Apple a fine, 'Job well-done.' It works mostly like a Powerbook loosing its AC power except that various alarms go off to warn us that we're on battery power. But you aint seen bad battery life until you've seen a dual 2.0 G5 (two 160 mb mirrored drives and 2 gb of RAM) run on batteries! I haven't seen anything go down quite so fast since 1000HP quit in the front of a floatplane in the arctic (there is, BTW, no better sound in the world than your airplane engine starting back-up again).
Thanks again for the great tip.

Hi Folks:
My Mac G4 just failed the 'pull the plug' test! I have a single-processor G4 (two G4's actually, one with an LCD and one a conventional 17' display). Each G4 is on its own ES 500 APC UPS power supply.
What else can I tell you? I'm running Panther 10.3.9. I installed PowerChute. It seemed to install just fine, and is controlled from the energy saver item in the System Preferences. But when I pull the plug on the APC .. well the APC stays on (how lovely for it), but the CPU and monitor immediately go dead. Help! My UPS battery registers 100% - surely that model has enough juice to last long enough to shut down a little old
G4.
Help!?
ABug

Many UPSs have a row of outlets that are not actually connected to the battery, but only provide electrical spike protection, surge protection if you will. Take a close look at the instructions that came with your UPS and if you still have problems, open up a new topic in the forums and someone can help you there.

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Ah, you are a genius. That was it. The unit is not clearly marked (unless you know you are looking for one battery backup, and 5 surge
protection ports). The one I was plugged into looked a lot like the former, but was the latter. Thanks!!!!!

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This is such a great hint! The 'Bulldog Plus' software that comes with my Belkin UPS is great - but only if you NEVER allow the computer to sleep. Once a sleep/wake cycle occurs, Bulldog Plus can never recognize the UPS via the provided USB connection, and sends false warning messages to the front window every minute. Very irritating.
Thanks for making my UPS much more useful to me! OR does the same problem occur if my Mac is asleep? ugh.