[Discuss] Surge Protection

[Steve Litt]

On Sun, 3 Jun 2018 19:47:52 -0400
jbk <jbk at kjkelra.com> wrote:

> On 06/03/2018 07:31 PM, Steve Litt wrote:
> >
> > jbk said "die". If he meant permanently destroyed, I think a better
> > surge protector *would* have helped, as perhaps there was a spike
> > that rode along with the outage. If he meant the computers turned
> > off, then yes, nothing short of a UPS would help that. I use a UPS,
> > and it keeps me working through an average of I'd say 3 brief
> > outages per month. 
> > SteveT  
> Yep, I meant die. I replaced two power supplies along with 
> buying an APC ups. I have two now, the other I was using 
> just for my phone. The computer sharing my phone I'm going 
> to have cascade to critical at 90% remaining because I want 
> to prolong the phone service, the backup server can cease 
> operations immediately.

If I were you, I would purchase both of:

1) An adequately sized Uninterruptable Power Supply (UPS)

2) A > 3500 Joule surge protector.

I think when I do this I plug the UPS into the wall, and the surge
protector into the UPS, and the computer into the surge protector.

Surge protectors are great for what they do, but their built-in surge
protectors are somewhat anemic (around 700 joules).

On computers, an undervolt condition can cause permanent damage. This
has personally happened to me.

Perhaps your outages aren't a relatively instant drop to zero, but a
half second where the lights dim and then go out. A UPS would be vital
in protecting against that.

HTH,

SteveT

Steve Litt 
June 2018 featured book: Twenty Eight Tales of Troubleshooting
http://www.troubleshooters.com/28