Without the software, there is no power down option, which means unless you are at the computer when an outage occurs, you still get an uncontrolled shutdown as if you had no protection.

That gives me plenty of time for an orderly shutdown of the HTPC, and to turn off the TV

The purpose of acquiring this UPS was twofold; battery based UPS for timely PC shutdown as well as surge protection for the other components in the home entertainment console

At this load it will last about an hour which is more than enough to do a graceful shutdown of the sever and network equipment.

This unit is adequate for the home entertainment center application, or a simple home office with a single PC and monitor to allow the time necessary for an orderly shutdown