Post
by CameronBornAndBred » July 12th, 2010, 11:57 pm
Thunder is asunder. I bet it doesn't even rain here. This morning I got a service call to a client (one of the beach clubs), three computers got zapped by lightning. The strike got them through their ethernet lines, this is common. Luckily, one of the network switches got zapped before the 4th computer. In 2 of the computers I had to swap out the PCI network cards, they were very lucky they even had them. If they were on the motherboard, the PC probably would have been toast. Both cards literally had their chips blasted off of them, nice scorch mark on each. The bell tolled for the third PC. It had a PCI card too (meaning it was not built in) but it was still toasted too much, it got the CPU.
So, to all of you out there in CTN land. If you are smart, buy yourself an ethernet surge protector, or a surge protector strip that has this built in. The lighting hits your phone line (DSL) or cable and travels across it. Your tv might be fine, other equipment might be fine, but one pc might be dead. My client was lucky. They have 15 PC's total and only lost one computer and a 5 port switch. Their 24 port switch was also smoked, but only on the affected ports, and they had 5 to spare.
Duke born, Duke bred, cooking on a grill so I'm tailgate fed.