Safe way to test UPS operation

[molusc]

How can I test the operation of the UPS without risking an unsafe shutdown of the Qnap?

I thought about unmounting the main drive but it says the device is busy.

Can anyone advise me of a safe way to test the UPS?
Is unmounting the right approach?
What services do I need to stop to enable me to unmount the drive?
Would doing that also stop the UPS (NUT) service?


A bit of background/context...

I have a couple of Qnaps, a TS-210 and a TS-220

I have just bought an APC Back-UPS ES 700 and connected both Qnaps to it.

I connected the data cable to the TS-220 and set up the UPS as external device. The Qnap shows all the expected info about the UPS.

I set up network UPS master/slave between the 2 Qnaps, and the second one also displayed the UPS info. I took this to mean they were communicating properly.

I tried to test by shutting off the power to the UPS. The UPS switched to battery and gave the usual warning beeps. However, the Qnaps both had power cut immediately.

Obviously when I restored power and they came back up, they were complaining about unsafe shutdown and unclean filesystems.

The TS-220 is currently synchronizing; it's been running for 13 hours and it's on 52%. After that finishes I'll need to do file system check. I know from experience that this will take about 2-3 days in total. This is why I bought the UPS in the first place...

I'm not sure if there's an issue with the UPS, but I don't want to cause further unsafe shutdowns when I test it, hence this post.

[dolbyman]

shut both qnap down(and disconnect from tge ups) and test the ups with any other non critical device (dvd player..desk lamp. etc)

if the ups fails there too, it's defective

[molusc]

Yes I plan to do that first, but assuming that works I'll then want to confirm the shutdown works for the Qnaps.

I guess thinking about it, testing the shutdown is different than testing that power remains on. Testing proper shutdown shouldn't have any risk of unsafe shutdown.

Thanks, that has helped.

[dolbyman]

make sure the ups works..then set the protection time to 5min unplug the ups from power and see if both qnaps shut down (maybe set the master to six and the slave to 5 min)

[molusc]

Just to wrap up this thread, it turned out the UPS was faulty.

I now have a replacement which I'm testing.

[molusc]

For future reference, here are 2 tests you can do with a UPS. Neither of these risk an unsafe shutdown of the Qnap.

Test UPS works on battery - Plug a lamp into the UPS and disconnect mains power. Lamp should stay on.

Test Qnap auto shutdown on power outage - Connect the UPS data cable to Qnap and configure shutdown, but leave Qnap connected directly to the mains, not the UPS. Then disconnect UPS from mains power. Qnap should shut down according to the settings you used, but there is zero risk of unsafe shutdown if UPS battery runs out.

One sort-of related tip... normally RAID sync after unsafe shutdown can take several days. If you enable Bitmap on the RAID volume it takes only a few seconds. (Control Panel --> Storage Manager --> RAID Management --> Action) There is a minor performance penalty, but for most people it's worth it.