1. Field
The present invention relates generally to electrical power supplies and, more specifically to uninterruptible power supplies.
2. Description of the Related Art
Computer racks, such as server racks, are generally used to house and in some cases interconnect collections of computing devices, like servers and associated storage, power supplies, network switches, and the like. In many cases, the computing devices are relatively numerous and arranged in a relatively high-density array due to the cost of space appropriate to store such computing devices and the desire to reduce latency by having the devices close to one another.
Often, the computing devices run computing applications having higher up-time goals than can be provided by grid electrical power. Power outages can cause data centers to cease operations. In some cases, backup power supplies, such as diesel generators and batteries are used to supply backup power in the event of a power outage. But in many cases, these systems are too slow to respond to an outage (e.g., many diesel generators), or are larger than is desired for modular data center rack designs, where the backup power supply is built into a rack (e.g., many battery-based backup power supplies).