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Only an electrician will be able to tell you how your building is wired. Each building is unique.
Ours for example is just on a separate circuit but still go through the earth leakage circuit breaker and through a central lightning protection system on the DB.
That said we have dedicated one phase of our 3 phase supply to the pc's' The other 2 phases is for aircons and lights/Kitchen.
The general idea though is that stuff like heaters /kettles and the vacuum machine going faulty don't trip out your computers.
Ours for example is just on a separate circuit but still go through the earth leakage circuit breaker and through a central lightning protection system on the DB.
That said we have dedicated one phase of our 3 phase supply to the pc's' The other 2 phases is for aircons and lights/Kitchen.
The general idea though is that stuff like heaters /kettles and the vacuum machine going faulty don't trip out your computers.
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As stated above red plugs are generally for computer equipment.
They can be connected to a UPS or bypass the earth leakage or even just be a dedicated circuit.
The whole bypassing the earth leakage thing is that a computer power supply will send a few mili-amps of current down the earth leakage no matter what. Now this isn't a problem but when you start to get more than about 20 p.c. (this happened to me) the earth leakage will trip. And it can be a problem.
When the red plugs are connected to a UPS it generally is not a good idea to connect your printers and copiers to it, only ones using lazer technology. This is because a lazer printer lets say a HP 4050 lazer printer will have a startup load that will kill a 1000 VA UPS. By kill I mean I have seen APC 1000 VA UPS' smoke and blow when it starts to print.
Newer printers are a lot more energy efficient.
So it is always a good idea to first find out how the plugs are wired before plugging all your computer equipment into it.
They can be connected to a UPS or bypass the earth leakage or even just be a dedicated circuit.
The whole bypassing the earth leakage thing is that a computer power supply will send a few mili-amps of current down the earth leakage no matter what. Now this isn't a problem but when you start to get more than about 20 p.c. (this happened to me) the earth leakage will trip. And it can be a problem.
When the red plugs are connected to a UPS it generally is not a good idea to connect your printers and copiers to it, only ones using lazer technology. This is because a lazer printer lets say a HP 4050 lazer printer will have a startup load that will kill a 1000 VA UPS. By kill I mean I have seen APC 1000 VA UPS' smoke and blow when it starts to print.
Newer printers are a lot more energy efficient.
So it is always a good idea to first find out how the plugs are wired before plugging all your computer equipment into it.
I understand your point but I think that Printers should not be plugged into a UPS.
Correct .. Printers .. Air-cons and lights should not be connected to the UPS [Uninterrupted Power Supply]
Also .. a Red plug doesn’t mean that the Building has back up power [UPS or Generator], it basically means that that particular plugs is not linked to an earth leakage [White Plugs on earth Leakage - if plug 1 Fails, the earth leakage would trip which means that all circuits connected to it will trip .. it can be up to 15 plugs]
Also note that the UPS is there to give you time to shut down your kit if you don’t have a Generator.
In the case of a generator, the UPS is there to carry the low until the Generator kicks in.
Besides the Red plugs with the shaven earth, there's also the Black Plug which also has a shaven earth, but the pin is slanted. In some cases, this is used for Air-cons or to indicate Generator Back-up power.
Also .. a Red plug doesn’t mean that the Building has back up power [UPS or Generator], it basically means that that particular plugs is not linked to an earth leakage [White Plugs on earth Leakage - if plug 1 Fails, the earth leakage would trip which means that all circuits connected to it will trip .. it can be up to 15 plugs]
Also note that the UPS is there to give you time to shut down your kit if you don’t have a Generator.
In the case of a generator, the UPS is there to carry the low until the Generator kicks in.
Besides the Red plugs with the shaven earth, there's also the Black Plug which also has a shaven earth, but the pin is slanted. In some cases, this is used for Air-cons or to indicate Generator Back-up power.