What size UPS do I need? A UK sizing guide (2026)
Sizing a UPS comes down to four numbers: the watts your kit draws, the VA that implies, the headroom and growth you add, and the runtime you need. Get any one wrong and you either overload the UPS or pay for capacity you…
UPS runtime explained: why batteries fade faster under load
Ask “how long will my UPS run?” and the honest answer is “it depends” — on the load, the battery, its age and its temperature. The one thing that is certain is that a battery delivers far less than its rated capacity at …
VA vs watts vs amps: power factor explained for IT
Watts, volt-amps and amps describe the same electricity in three different ways, and the link between them — power factor — is where most UPS and circuit sizing mistakes happen. This guide explains all three plainly, wit…
UPS topologies: standby vs line-interactive vs online
UPS come in three topologies — standby, line-interactive and online double-conversion — defined by the IEC 62040-3 standard (VFD, VI and VFI). They differ in how cleanly they protect the load and how much they cost to ru…
Server room cooling: how much do you need? (UK guide)
Undersized cooling is one of the most common causes of thermal shutdowns and shortened hardware life in UK server rooms. The good news: the heat you must remove is almost exactly the power your IT draws, so sizing is str…
UPS batteries: VRLA vs lithium-ion (UK 2026)
The battery is the part of a UPS that wears out — and the choice between valve-regulated lead-acid (VRLA) and lithium-ion now changes the whole ownership story. Lithium costs more upfront but lasts far longer, tolerates …
SAN vs NAS vs DAS: how to choose the right storage architecture (UK 2026)
Three letters decide how your servers see their storage: DAS, NAS or SAN. Choose wrong and you either overspend on a shared array a single server never needed, or you bolt a file appliance onto a problem that demanded sh…
iSCSI vs Fibre Channel: choosing a block-storage SAN fabric (UK 2026)
Once you have decided you need a SAN, the next question is how the servers reach it: iSCSI over ordinary Ethernet, Fibre Channel over a dedicated storage fabric, or — for one or two hosts — direct-attached SAS. The old f…
HPE ProLiant DL380 Gen12 buyer's guide: maxed-out 2U for AI-adjacent workloads (UK)
The HPE ProLiant DL380 Gen12 takes the most popular 2U server and brings it into the AI-adjacent era: the newest Intel Xeon generation, faster memory and PCIe Gen5 expansion that makes it a credible home for accelerators…
RAID levels explained: the complete guide (2026)
RAID combines several drives into one array for capacity, speed or redundancy — but every level trades those three against each other differently. This guide explains how each level works, what it costs in capacity, and …
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