UPS EatonUPS_xxx is unavailable

[Michel-angelo]

Hello;

I have already experienced 5-minutes power outages. A few lasted even longer and the protected pfSense SG-1000 firewall router ("Firewall") was properly shut-down. In all situations, my Eaton UPS 850 KVA, located in the house basement with my Firewall to which it is connected by USB, re-connects to the Firewall and all ends well.

Not this time. The power outage lasted less than 5 minutes, no particular issue here.

Since yesterday afternoon, I now receive every five minutes a mail notification from the firewall
""UPS EatonUPS_de_la_cave_des_Alluets is unavailable"

I have therefore stopped the notification on the firewall control panel, which does not solve anything.

What went wrong ?

Yhe UPS seems to work. How should I test it ?

The SG-1000 firewall has not been shut down. How should I test it ?

The USB Cable is a 2-parts cable: the original Eaton USB cable and an additional female USB (connected to the Eaton cable and a male micro-USB connected to the firewall. This is a standard 1-to-1 connection between the UPS and the protected device (the pfSense SG-1000 firewall), using only the pfSense software that relates to the UPS, a standard install on the device. Should I look for a cable in one piece ?) Should I conduct tests on the software ?

It worked, it does not anymore. Any suggestion would be greatly welcome. TIA

[stephenw10]

First try running usbconfig at the command line and make sure it still sees the UPS attached.

Steve

[Michel-angelo]

@stephenw10 Thanks Steve.

Thanks Steve. Trying
usbconfig at Diagnostics:Command Prompt

usbconfig

ugen1.1: <Mentor Graphics OTG Root HUB> at usbus1, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=HIGH (480Mbps) pwr=SAVE (0mA)
ugen0.1: <Mentor Graphics OTG Root HUB> at usbus0, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=HIGH (480Mbps) pwr=SAVE (0mA)

I also had a look at usbconfig -h

Whatever the UPS has to say does not seem to be declared as audible by the Firewall.

Could it be due to a non-performing cable ? I built a second cable: same spec (1) female USB to male micro USB (I had purchased a pair of them from uGreen) and a standard USB cable for 3.5" external hard drive. No improvement with a new cable.

REBOOT. I had not tried a reboot.
I shut down the firewall, shut everything down (two routers, UPS, network, wifi, all computers) and rebooted everything. No change.

What could I be doing wrong ?

Power failure ? The power failure was caused by a short circuit by a contractor working at my home (a painter) which caused the home main circuit breaker to break. Should I dig into this ?

Many thanks in advance for ideas.

[stephenw10]

Mmm, the UPS should show as device there even if it's not recognised. That looks like a bad cable or bad port. Bad hub maybe?

[Michel-angelo]

@stephenw10 Thanks

Thanks Steve. I do not know how to interpret and further question usbconfig. On your three suggested topics:

Bad cable ?

Bad cable was my prime newbies' suspect. The cable is made of two parts:

(1) the UPS' cable part which is supplied with the UPS and identical, as far as I can see, to standard USB cables for 3.5" hard drives. I have many of them, which I can prove work in other settings, including by the direct connection between the UPS and an iMac. The imac notices there is an UPS on the other side, which seems to prove that all my UPS-side cables are good: (2)

(2) the SG-1000 ("Firewall") cable part, which is a female USB 3 to male micro-USB. I had a few of these (maybe including one supplied with the SG-1000 itself). When I installed the UPS 1 or 2 years ago, I purchased a pair of such expensive uGreen cables. The prospect of all failing at the same time has a very low probability. I believe these cables are all right.

I will test these two in other services tomorrow. But I doubt they will show any weakness cables for this service. No significant reason to doubt them all.

Bad port ?

The micro-USB connector is a weak link imho. Seems fragile and I never quite trusted it. However I remember using it a while ago to reinitialise the sG-1000 with the 2.4 installer through console, using this port. At the time it worked.

Bad Hub ?

As far as I can tell, no hub is involved (at least outside the SG-1000). Would there be a hub inside ?

Is there a way to test that ?

Top of my head, the sole road I have not tested is the route involving a raspberry pi connected to (protected by) the UPS and giving secondary instructions to other protected devices (mainly to the SG-1000) to instruct them to shutdown when needed, using the NUTS (i think) linux software. I don't dare to try such a difficult route. I don't do Linux.

Any suggestion ? Any test ? Thanks, again, for ideas. ===group

===

[stephenw10]

Unplug the UPS and then run usbconfig.

Then plug the UPS back in and re-run usbconfig.

You should see the extra device shown. If it's not visible on the USB bus then you probably have some hardware level failure.

You should also see some entries in the system log showing the new USB device when it's connected.

Steve

[Michel-angelo]

@stephenw10. It has resumed working, attached directly to the UPS. !!
Nothing was forever damaged.
The way the SG-1000 was attached to its DIN rail, I had not noticed that there were two micro-usb connectors on the SG-1000 bottom. Further, I had not seen on the notice the mention that one of these ports (the one I was attempting to use, in error) is reserved for console access. Further, some cables simply do not work.
After having tested, some of my cables demonstrated they worked, but only in the proper hole on the SG-1000.

Thanks, Steve, for the help. My tiny SG-1000 still works with all its glory. As long as I do not need the fiber speed, I will get him to do the required work for my home.