Lightning Storm
Its that time of year again. There are many summer storms coming and with them come power outages. While this is an inconvenience it usually comes with very little consequences. You may have had a power outage and never had an issue with your computer following the outages. But power outage effects linger in computers long after you have forgotten about the storm.Here are 4 things about power outages you need to know.
1. They happen more often than you thinkWhile its hard to determine how often outages happen the electric companies are telling us they are happening more and more often. Power outages can happen during storms and due to other interruptions such as construction or auto accidents. The key is that there will be an outage in your area soon.
2. Turning the power back on is the problemOutages don’t hurt computers or electronics. Its the turning back on that does. When the power comes back on it tends to “surge” and if it surges to much your computers internal board takes the hit. Surges can happen even when the power never went off. Sometimes an error can cause the power to surge.
3. Just because you have a surge protector doesn’t mean it will workSurge protectors are rated for so many surges and so many voltages. Once they are aged out you are no better off. You need to replace your surge protector every so many years. Most manufacturers put this information on their surge protectors.
4. Power strips are not surge protectorsMany times I have found power strips or rather power hubs that were thought to be surge protectors melted. This happens in two ways, one way where the power surged from the service and the other way where what was plugged into it was requesting to much power and it melted and damaged everything else plugged into it. Be sure you have a real surge protector.
No matter what you need good equipment to protect your computers and electronics. I own DataCom Technologies and we specialize in computer protection. trust us with your needs.
