#THE WIRECUTTER ANTENNA PC#
#THE WIRECUTTER ANTENNA TV#

If you thought the surge protector was for lightning, upvote. That article should have pointed out that if there is lightning nearby, unplug your shit! If my clock/radio did not fry, can I or can I not presume there was not a, substantial, surge?Īm I buying too many of these things or not!!!?!?!ĭon't LOL at those of us that believed this shit. I asked about this and you are the first to address it. And for lightning strikes you're SOL anyway. Inside big electronics the power supply is usually very robust, they're just fine with or without a surge protector. So what is the typical average life of surge protectors in a fairly well regulated suburban environment?Honestly, I wouldn't bother.

#THE WIRECUTTER ANTENNA TV#

However I do have a large LED TV plugged into one that is 10 years old, and I have to move the whole damn thing to just look at it to see if its still working, be nice to know the average lifetime of these things.

#THE WIRECUTTER ANTENNA PC#

On my expensive equipment and backup devices I have them plugged into a UPS (or the line-conditioning/surge protection outlets it has) so I never really cared about how really effective the older ones that my cheap PC speakers are plugged into. I have seen surge protectors that have a led on, and sometimes instead of being solid on, it constant flickers, is that an indication that it is worn out? I don't suppose this is effective anymore (its plugged into a newer surge protector anyway, just being used for needed extra outlets)

I have a surge protector from my first PC (IBM PC XT) in 1983 that has been in constant usage for the most part. So one could last 20 years if you have relatively no surges? Or is there a baseline wear in addition to wear from surges?Īlso what about surge protectors plugged into other surge protectors, does this extend the life of the ones 'down the line'? So what is the typical average life of surge protectors in a fairly well regulated suburban environment?įrom what I gathered, the life of the surge protector is roughly based on how many surges it protects against. almost everything has a vampire draw now (standby mode), so they're constantly susceptible to power issues.Īside from all that, projectors and similar need time to cool down, or the life of the bulb goes way down. but, i think most damage is done through smaller surges and power outages that happen more often than we see, such as during the day while we're away. then, even if there is a surge, the network can surge relative to your PC and there's generally not an issue. there are some CAT cables that have metal connectors grounded to each other, and they can ground devices together (those cables often came with older cable modems), but just don't use them. all CAT5/6 networking devices have at least transformers between their power plane and the CAT cables going out to wherever, so they're basically floating relative to the rest of the network. the cableTV cable can have some pretty high voltages sneaking along it, and i think a UPS helps float the modem so it doesn't see a surge through the power lines while the modem is otherwise pinned to the local ground/neutral. cell towers seem to have less UPS time.Īnyway, i think battery backup is particularly helpful to keep cable/DSL modems healthy. i think the cable head end has it's own UPS that dies about then. it protects them from surges, and it keeps my internet up through all brownouts and most blackouts less than about 11 hours long (a meager UPS has enough capacity to power modems, routers, switches, and wifi for a long time). Many have a bank of battery backup ports and surge protection only ports, and I'd be interested in the different surge protection, if any.Īs an aside, i've placed all my network devices on a single UPS for over a decade. I would love to see similar run down on the protection offered by battery backup systems, UPS, etc.

The wirecutter antenna