On Monday, October 26, 2015 at 12:55:46 PM UTC-4, wrote:
On Mon, 26 Oct 2015 06:49:54 -0700 (PDT), westom
wrote:

On Monday, October 26, 2015 at 12:02:16 AM UTC-4, Muggles wrote:
I don't really expect the back-up to protect from a major lightning
strike. It's more to protect from power surges like when the wind is
blowing and the power goes off briefly and back on again.

Those are sags or blackouts - not surges. A UPS would provide temporary power so that a reboot need not happen.

A surge is a high voltage. Power outage or dimming is a low voltage - not a surge.
When the power comes back on, particularly in those storm situations
where the power never really goes "out" but the lights blink - THAT is
when you get real "surges" - not to confused with the high amperage
high voltage "spikes" created by lightning. They can damage sensitive
electronics over time.

Any inductive loads on the line store energy and release it when the
power colapses,

Clearly the IEEE, NIST, etc refer to transients on power and communication
lines caused by lightning as "surges". Read the guides. Calling it
something else and saying it's not a surge, just adds to the confusion.
They sell surge protectors. Haven't seen one called a "spike" protector.