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Eaton UPS vs Schneider Electric-APC Smart-UPS VT [EOL] comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 27, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Eaton UPS
Average Rating
9.0
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Data Center Power Solutions (1st)
Schneider Electric-APC Smar...
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Featured Reviews

JC
Provides more uptime for our Linear Accelerator, resulting in better patient care
The battery life seems to be pretty good. I don't have a lot of experience with other units of its size, but it does a good job of keeping our unit up. There is no active power management. It just keeps the power up. We haven't had any power failures that are long enough to completely drain the battery. It's been good for small power failures. In addition, I can access the built-in webpage on the UPS and use that to look at the status. It's on all the time and monitoring. It gives us an email once a month telling us that our device is working properly. It will also list the power events that happened in that month.
Reasonably priced, simple to install, and responsive technical support
Mexico's situation is too difficult. While there may be many complaints, many projects may be canceled because funds are not currently available. I want to improve a lot of things, but the main point is money. The vendor could be better, but the point is that we don't have the right vendor in Guadalajara. Guadalajara is a small town in Mexico, and there are no expert engineers in that field here. We need to hire people from Monterey, and from Mexico, which is why the solution may be expensive. We don't want to buy a cheaper solution because cheaper isn't always better. We have no desire to save money, we would like a solution. Schneider's vendor, I believe, needs to be more involved with the customer. We have to constantly look for them because they don't come to me. I have to go there, and I don't want to. I don't want to waste time looking for a vendor. We require immediate attention. It should be easier to contact technical support.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"We have utilized the building-block nature of the solution as we have grown. We can add modules, which helps from a cost standpoint and protects the initial capital investment in the system, rather than having to completely replace the system. We can start small scale and incrementally fund additional capacity as needed rather than purchasing a system, having to pull it out, and buying a brand new one."
"The touch-screen functionality is easy to read. There are tabs at the top and there are statuses at the top, graphics that give you a quick glance. We use the touch-screen for metering, to make sure the input and output meters are good. We also check alarm events and system history. Those are the things we usually check the most."
"Scalability has been pretty good. We were able to increase the battery. We only installed one battery cabinet, then we added a second one for additional capacity later on. That was a nice feature that others haven't been able to do."
"It's also very important that it's a rack-mountable, three-phase UPS. Some of the equipment we run requires a three-phase, such as HPE BladeSystems and some of the Cisco core devices."
"VMMS is a good feature. There are multiple charging units inside each UPS. For example, on my 9395 I have three to four charging units and the unit will scale down. Let's say I've got a megawatt of power. If I'm only running 200 Kw I can drop the charging units down and rotate through the charging units to reduce energy. They do all that."
"The visibility the PredictPulse service provides into our UPS equipment through the reporting is very good. It gives us very high visibility. We can go into the card and look at every parameter, all the settings, all the values. There are several tabs we can look at. We get a very good understanding of what the unit is doing, all remotely. It's very good."
"Their service and their relationship with their customers is their biggest value, absolutely, compared to the competitors that I've dealt with... the service organization of Eaton is one of their strongest points."
"The footprint is standard, the same thing as every other solution that we could have gotten. But the power density in relation to its footprint compares really well. I have an APC that has the same footprint that's 20kW less. The Eatons have the same footprint but more power."
"Stability is one of the key points. The durability and lifetime of the product are also notable."
"You can scale it by adding batteries."
"We have not had a lot of issues over the many years we have been using the solution."
"I like it because we don't have any problems."
 

Cons

"We do not use Eaton's remote monitoring, we use StruxureWare. We do use all of Eaton's web interface cards and their SNMP polling, but it's actually going to a Schneider product. Eaton makes something similar, it just wasn't as intuitive."
"The battery life of the older batteries is the only thing that has been our issue up to this point. Luckily, the Cellwatch system that is on there identifies it and notifies us ahead of time when we should get them changed pretty quickly. This may be addressed with the lithium-ion batteries, but it is too early in our ownership of a UPS with a lithium-ion battery to know."
"I do like the ESS mode which I operate with the 9395s. However, I've got an issue with one of my UPS strings here in Denver: That ESS mode is too sensitive to utility noise. So the utility shows no outages but I've got the UPS switching it in and out of ESS mode."
"Deployment of the product is typical. It's usually a six-week lead-time, which is typical of most equipment. It's not good, but it's just what is expected in the industry."
"I think the batteries are based on lead-acid technology so they have to be replaced every five years, but with the new lithium-ion battery technology that is available, it might be good if, at some point, they updated their battery technology."
"Outside of a full-service contract, my only concern is technician availability for repairs. Where we don't have a full-service contract with them, which unfortunately is the larger portion of our equipment from them, we're just like anybody else, waiting for a slot for a technician to arrive."
"When it comes to the power management software portion, that's the part that I haven't really seen or heard a lot about. The dashboards of the UPS's, or the management software, are one area that they could probably improve a little."
"I would like to see there is a little more clarity on what the issue is on the notifications that we receive. This would make it easier for us. What we have to do now is sometimes go to the UPS to figure out exactly what the issue is, because it's not always clear."
"Schneider's vendor, I believe, needs to be more involved with the customer. We have to constantly look for them because they don't come to me. I have to go there, and I don't want to. I don't want to waste time looking for a vendor. We require immediate attention."
"The solution’s pricing could be improved."
"We have been having some issues with the solutions controller and we are having problems finding spare parts."
"The duration of the batteries could be much better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The UPSs are saving us approximately $50,000 a year."
"I have mixed feelings about the pricing and licensing. I believe that when you sell a UPS, and considering the UPS is a lifeline to a lot of the major corporations, the monitoring solution should be part of the package automatically, out-the-door. If you have to raise that price on the UPS an extra $5,000, then do so at that moment. Don't have that as an extra offer after the UPS has been sold. I believe that all UPSs need to have high availability, all the latest software installed, and be ready to go out-the-door."
"We use their service plan, which includes parts so we don't do the maintenance on it ourselves. We have a service plan that we use, then they do all the maintenance and periodical maintenance (PM) work. If there are any hardware failures, then they also do the work. Therefore, it's a hardware/software support contract that includes labor."
"The pricing is far more competitive than APC or Liebert, the other two big players. And Eaton's service is phenomenal."
"They are around $50,000 to $70,000 depending on the options and the modules that we get."
"It saves our company money. Because if there is an outage, it is approximately $1 million a minute for an outage. Since we are a very large credit union, outages would be very expensive for us."
"When you bid them out, they're all within a single-digit percentage point of each other... The cost of Eaton's service is competitive because we bid it out. I bid the service for all my units on campus: APCs, Lieberts, Eatons, because we've got a big hodgepodge of everything. Eaton won on price."
"I have a maintenance contract with Eaton, which has been very good. The notifications that we receive, we use email to my team, and they work well."
"It is not expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
9%
Construction Company
8%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
8%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise9
No data available
 

Also Known As

Eaton Powerware, Powerware 9300 Series
Smart-UPS VT
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Gamatronic
The Boston Red Sox