International Business Machines Corporation

Patrick A Cerra, Jr

Charles Vernon Zenz, Sr

Methods and apparatus are set forth for automatically controlling a battery back-up unit (BBU) associated with a rack mounted device, under rack A.C. power outage, rack Emergency Power Off (EPO) and normal rack power down conditions. The methods and apparatus contemplated by the invention deactivate the device BBU whenever either a rack Emergency Power Off (EPO) or normal rack power down condition exists so that BBU power is not unnecessarily drained. The invention features the ability to perform the aforestated device BBU control function without having to redesign a rack enclosure, and without having to use or generate rack signals other than 'non-specific' signals, defined as signals that are being generated and used for purposes other than device level BBU switching in a commercially available rack enclosure.

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Endicott, NY, United States of America

Patrick A Cerra, Jr