QNAP NAS Can Act as LAN UPS Controller to Shut Down Multiple Devices After Power Loss

According to the tutorial, the UPS USB cable should be connected to the QNAP NAS, with the NAS, switch, router and other protected devices plugged into the UPS output sockets. In QTS, the user opens Console > Hardware > UPS, selects USB as the connection type and enables UPS support. The NAS then recognizes the APC UPS. The article says the NAS should be the last device to shut down; in the example the auto-shutdown delay is set to five minutes, so all client devices must trigger shutdown earlier.

The tutorial also says to enable the network UPS server and add the IP addresses of all devices that need NUT access to the allowed list. Devices outside the list are refused. To verify the service, the user can log in over SSH and run upsc -l 127.0.0.1 and upsc qnapups@127.0.0.1. The first command should output qnapups; the second should print battery level, input voltage and estimated runtime, indicating the NUT server is ready.

For a second NAS, the article describes selecting Network UPS slave in QTS and entering the IP address of the NAS connected to the UPS by USB. The slave's shutdown wait time should be shorter than the master's. If the GUI fails to show UPS data, the article says the connection can be tested over SSH with upsc qnapups@[master IP].

For Windows, the tutorial uses the open-source WinNUT-Client because Windows has no native NUT client. The connection settings are the QNAP NAS IP, port 3493, UPS name qnapups, login qnapups, password 123456 and polling interval 5. The article recommends enabling reconnect and applying the settings. Once connected, the main window shows input voltage, battery level, load and estimated runtime.

In the shutdown settings, the article recommends shutting down when battery falls below 30 percent or runtime falls below 120 seconds, with a 60-second delay to allow users to save work. It says the "disable NUT FSD signal" option must not be checked, because FSD is the forced shutdown signal sent by the NUT master when the UPS battery is nearly exhausted; disabling it would leave Windows exposed to abrupt power loss in extreme low-battery scenarios. The article also notes that WinNUT's Windows autostart only starts the GUI after a user logs in, so unattended machines may need a tool such as NSSM to run it as a system service.

The article says that with the NUT network UPS protocol, one UPS can coordinate graceful shutdown across multiple devices. It adds that although QNAP's official documentation describes its own NAS interconnection, the underlying service is standard NUT and can be configured to work with third-party devices such as Windows PCs.