Lightning struck near our house last night, and took out the cable modem, the router, and one of our computers.
The ISP replaced the modem for free, luckily, but it still sucks.
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Lightning struck near our house last night, and took out the cable modem, the router, and one of our computers.
The ISP replaced the modem for free, luckily, but it still sucks.
that does suck, but at least it's fixed now.
When I hear thunder. I shutdown -h now and unplug everything as fast as I can. I'm paranoid like that.
But I don't know. Maybe I should tape off my hard drive, wait for a decent lightning storm, let it get burnt to hell. Maybe insurance would give me a better one.
Hah, it's sort of fixed. I still need to get a new router (insurance might cover it), and we're out a computer (insurance won't pay much for a 266mhz probably)
You should get a surge supressor with, at least, 900 Joules of protection. Also, an online UPS would be good, but they cost alot if you want to get one that can support over 300Watts for a decent amount of time to save your work and shut down.
I was almost done installing Linux when lightning knocked the power out at my house. I wouldn't have started the installation if I knew it was going to storm, but, because this was an old computer, it was a couple of hours earlier that I had started the installation, and it was sunny then. For my newer computer, I don't mess around: I immediately shut down the computer and unplug everything.
I have seen worse though. Lightning struck a power line behind a row of houses across the street from where I live, and that caused sparks to fly everywhere and smoke to come out as the surge moved down the line. I was lucky that it only knocked out the power across the street. In the next couple of days, as the power company was fixing the power line, it began storming again! They didn't seem too happy about that.
It's been looking like it's going to storm here for the past several hours. I'm keeping my fingers crossed...
The computer we lost was connected to a UPS with surge protection AND another surge protector, but wasn't unplugged. The charge may have gone through the ethernet. However, if it did, it only knocked out that computer. Heh, all of our computer stuff is either on a UPS, surge protector, or some combination of the two, except the router and modem. ...I think I should fix that.
Can you get surge protectors for phone lines? I might have the same problem. I use surge prtotectors on everything else and unplug, etc.. but that's a concern for me now.
Yes, and they make one cable(coax) too.Quote:
Can you get surge protectors for phone lines?
I have a couple of them, even for my 'klassics' (apple 2, commodores...).
I've seen some pretty expensive surge protectors. Pretty neat lookin hehe...
We rarely get lighting near here and when we do it's always several miles away from our house
I do tech support for a US cable internet company, and we get quite a few calls whenever there's a storm. We even have people who think that their cable internet should be up when there is no power...
That would be nice.Quote:
We even have people who think that their cable internet should be up when there is no power...
Aye, it would be... if only cable modems didn't need power...
Unlike you people, I ALWAYS make sure to back up all of my 124.8 gigs of porn.
>> 124.8 gigs of porn.
Bah. That's it?
I feel no need to digitize my oversize - box VHS tapesQuote:
Originally posted by XSquared
>> 124.8 gigs of porn.
Bah. That's it?
...how would having a cable internet connection be of any use when the power is out?
What are you going to do, run your computer off your UPC so you can surf cprogramming.com?
Oh yeah. Computers take power too.
Every hear of generators? Computers arent that bad on power.
CRTs are, though. Although, if you're a webhost who hates downtime it would be a good idea to stay online in a power cut.Quote:
Originally posted by mart_man00
Every hear of generators? Computers arent that bad on power.
I forgot about that.Quote:
CRTs are, though.
LCDs are better on power but they cost alot more, maybe I should of paid the extra for a LCD(it would of been like $3500 total then, the reason why i didnt do it).
I used to worry about lightning but now my whole house is on a surge protector and I also have one that plugs into the wall. I've only had one computer ruined by lightning but it ended up beign good to scrap for the working parts.
>>...how would having a cable internet connection be of any use when the power is out?
Laptops. They don't need to be plugged in as long as they have battery life left. People think that since their laptop runs, their Internet should too.
How much did that cost you? Was is a pain installing? Any limit on devices/ warrrenty?Quote:
I used to worry about lightning but now my whole house is on a surge protector
Those things do sound kool.
I have no idea how much it costs wehn my parents were building the new house they just had it put in sicne we have alot of computer and TVs running all day and night. Oddly enough there is lightning in the sky as I am typing this.
Atleast we will know if its any good :DQuote:
Oddly enough there is lightning in the sky as I am typing
Well stupid storm caused the power to go out for awhile and then the worst thing happened...I lost my signal for both my satelite television and satelite internet access, I almost died!!! I don't think any lightning hit the house which is kind of sad b/c it would've been good research for this thread.:D
>>I used to worry about lightning but now my whole house is on a surge protector<<
A circut breaker costs au$100 here. I had three put into my house while I was renovating. Plus the $1 per minute for the electrician (2 hrs).
Don't want any nasty electrical surprises when relaxing in the spa.......
>>A circut breaker costs au$100 here.<<
im sorry, is that australian dollar. what is it in US? $70? $80?
>> How much did that cost you? Was is a pain installing? Any limit on devices/ warrrenty? <<
http://www.howstuffworks.com/surge-protector.htm
http://www.google.ca/search?q=surge+...-8&hl=en&meta=
surge protectors wont do jack if the lightening hits your house and the shortest path to the ground it through your pc...
Ben_Robotics, I was talking about the protecters for your home. They work with your Power Box. There supposed to be good, but i never tried one and i dont know any one with them.
Yeah, but the comany atleasts claims they will pay you. Thats all im really worried about anyway. Id bet against a fire most of the time.Quote:
surge protectors wont do jack if the lightening hits your house and the shortest path to the ground it through your pc...
It would aso be kinda rare for the shortest route to be through your pc.Quote:
Originally posted by mart_man00
Ben_Robotics, I was talking about the protecters for your home. They work with your Power Box. There supposed to be good, but i never tried one and i dont know any one with them.
Yeah, but the comany atleasts claims they will pay you. Thats all im really worried about anyway. Id bet against a fire most of the time.
Through the boots your standing in is just as feasable.
mart_man, does the company say explicitly that they'll pay if the surge protector fails due to lightning? Cause there's not a surge protector out there that will stop a hit from a lightning bolt, hell, a bolt will tear across the studs of your house just to get to the ground, there's enough energy it says screw running on the power or phone lines. So I'm guessing that the protectors cover black/brown outs and other various surges, nothing more. So don't count on getting stuff replaced by that company when lightning melts your processor to the board.
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btw fountain, electricity generally takes the shortest path, but, if something is in the way of a bolt (say a house) it moves unpredictably. Hell if it hits say, one of the main beams in your house it could send itself across every stud in the house, it has enough energy like i said it can conduct across a lot more mediums than the 220 coming into your house. Lightning has taken out computers more often than power surges coming across the grid. Basically with lightning, shortest path doesn't mean dick.