Inverter
A modified sine wave inverter produces a lower quality of AC power, with strong power system harmonics but is cheaper. The output of a typical modified sine wave inverter is a square wave with a pause between the change in direction. Various modulation strategies are used in cascaded multilevel inverters to reduce the harmonic contents. Modified sine inverters reduce the performance of some appliances, such as microwave ovens and appliances containing electric motors, and are known to damage some equipment including smoke detectors and some battery chargers.