Guess the DAMAGE

[dwynnehugh]

Delivered a new W10 set up about a month ago – all well and good.

Yesterday – storm and lightening – call from owner – wife had heard a bang in the house – no phones, no burglar alarm and no computer.

Looking at the Cat5 into the rear of the mobo – v large patches of black on the BT yellow – burning smell from CAT5 socket on rear of mobo.  Lightening strike somewhere on the BT line into house.

No obvious visual damage to mobo etc.

Well then – now as the title says ……  !!????

The more you meet people the more you understand why Noah took animals instead of humans

[Bob Williams]

Blown capacitors, mobo fragged.

 

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[Robin Long]

First crack of thunder here and the kids go Cold Turkey been their done that before! Have you assesed if their is any damage to the rest of the system yet?

 

Cheers Knight,

RIP Spike09 Your Missed
If I'm not here, I'm there.

Finally joined Twitter! longr79

[The Duke]

That sucks. We had a ton I’ve rain yesterday in a 20min period. Flood the whole of the town center, crossing the lot Inc my dentist which I attended to be turned away. In parts the water was knee high.

The neighbours that live 20 meters away get flooded evey time we get a “flash flood” we are lucky as the water is funneled around our house, but it passes at some speed and dept.

Today all is back to normal, leaving behind alot of debrie (??), from the mountain.

Touch wood, I’ve never had a lighting issue at my place. I can only imagine it sucks.

 

[JayCeeDee]

 

I had the same thing about 2 years ago. It took out the mobo and PSU, plus iirc graphics card and memory. It transpired that it messed up a laptop connected to the router, which also got taken out, but I didn’t claim for the laptop as I didn’t know till too late – the claim had gone in already.

The TV died too.

[Bob Williams]

23 bungalows surrounded by big old houses here! Always a first time though, I guess. 3 years ago a cricketer was struck on the massive, open Community Field, before they could get all the players off the pitch. His standing joke was “I was down, but NOT OUT, umpire!”

I think he gets bowled regularly now, too busy looking up if a cloud goes overhead… ??

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[D-Dan]

Have you tried a visual inspection for burnt components.

Personally, when the storms start I unplug the computer and remove the Eth cable from the socket. (mind you, 3rd floor flat, top one. I’ll be first hit)

Arch Linux, on a Ryzen 7 1800X, 32 GB, 5 (yes -5) HDs inc 5 SSDs, 4 RPi 3Bs + 1 RPi 4B - one as an NFS server with two more drives, PiHole (shut yours), Plex server, cloud server, and other random Pi stuff. Nice CoolerMaster case, 2 x NV GTX 1070 8GB, and a whopping 32" AOC 1440P monitor.

[dwynnehugh]

To date after a very short inspection post mobo removal – nothing stands out but it was a quick visual inspection.  No obvious holes or components hanging on by thin wires or burnt tracks for the sake of their lives at the moment!! No smoke either!

It’ll be a case of remove, inspect, test etc. etc.

The Cat5 socket on the mobo is not the same colour as on delivery!! ‼‼‼

I strongly suspect an act of God – He must be anti-Windows 10 – never had it on any other OS!! ?⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡

The more you meet people the more you understand why Noah took animals instead of humans

[Spedley]

I’d guess one part took all the damge if the machine was off. Probably knackered motherboard but I suspect all other components wilk be ok.
I had a similar situation a few years ago but forthnatley just the usb fried. A new pci-e card and the machine was good as new again.
Also, I’ve heard many reports that it is just the first device plugged into an extension socket that gets it. If nothing else, worth plugging the printer in first, you never know.

i7 4790s / 8GB / 480GB SSD / GTX 980 / 34" UltraWide : i3 4170 / 8GB / 480GB SSD / GTX 770 / 24" Samsung : i3 4130 / 8GB / 500GB Spinner / GTX 1050 / 23" Acer : Q9550 / 8GB / 1TB Spinner / GTX 580 / 22" Acer : i7 720QM / 8GB / 1TB+2TB+500GB Spinners (server) : i5 4570 / 8GB / 60GB SSD / 1TB / GeForce 210 / 22" Dell It's getting warm in here!

[dwynnehugh]

Yes, the owner said there was a ‘hell of a bang’ at the time, I said it was her PC knocking at Heaven’s door!!

Obviously will need to check PSU, RAM, HDD, Optical – which will be easy, I have to assume the mobo has gone to PC Heaven so it may be a replacement job and then see what state the CPU is in on the new mobo.

Isn’t life sometimes cr*p?? But if it wasn’t, there’d be nowt to complain about!!

The more you meet people the more you understand why Noah took animals instead of humans

[Bob Williams]

I possess only limited electrical knowledge and both family leccies are at work, so I may be speculating incorrectly: would an anti-surge extension prevent this?

Correct me if I’m wrong, happens all the time! ??

EDIT: Dwynne, take a close look at capacitors. Are they swollen, or otherwise visibly damaged?

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[Richard]

Bob Williams wrote:

I possess only limited electrical knowledge and both family leccies are at work, so I may be speculating incorrectly: would an anti-surge extension prevent this? Correct me if I’m wrong, happens all the time! EDIT: Dwynne, take a close look at capacitors. Are they swollen, or otherwise visibly damaged?

It does depend upon what was hit and how the surge came in. If it was via the the phone line or some other aspect, such as the aerial then probably a mains surge suppressor would not be much use. If it was via the mains feed then again possibly not, those anti-surge filters are not normally rated for the sort of jolt you get from lightening strikes. It was interesting that it was the network cable socket that apparently took the hit. The only safe way to stop such problems is to unplug everything and perhaps to install lightening conductors.

We had the area supply get blown off during the storm, possibly with two drops which the alarm system recorded, but apart from disturbed sleep we got off lightly.

I have just had one of those Computer support centre parasites call. You know the type, “Its about your windows computer”, having asked him which computer has a problem and pointed out that there is more than one his script fell on the floor. I did not manage to keep him wasting his time for very long sadly, as he soon followed his script and left the connection, oh so sad. Someone else will now be called.

[Robin Long]

Out of interest could this damage have been home plug related, would a jolt to the electrics affect a homeplug like that?

 

Cheers Knight,

RIP Spike09 Your Missed
If I'm not here, I'm there.

Finally joined Twitter! longr79

[Bob Williams]

Thanks Richard, I was under the impression that the Surge protection would stop it at the Power strip. Here is some information I gathered via Google:    https://tinyurl.com/y9x9edlt

If you search    hager.co.uk    there is a PDF with more technical information. Apparently you can buy a power strip which protects against lightning strikes, and is guaranteed to do so.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[dwynnehugh]

Not had time yet to do much with it but looks like the surge came in on the tel line – b/alarm, phone and BB dead!

Probably blown the router too – no homehub as such – just line to router – to PC.

Might have a look at the Hager stuff, see the price and advice them accordingly.

The more you meet people the more you understand why Noah took animals instead of humans

[Bob Williams]

Belkin have the best SP’s, Dwynne:

https://tinyurl.com/y7k26qnb

I’ve had one for about 5 years now, fortunately never had a strike. Once you have one, the SP should be u/s, time to buy another. Although they do say it doesn’t strike twice… (Cough!)

Doesn’t have to be a strike though, just electrical disturbance in the area. Sometimes you can tell: if there is any potential up there, the hairs on my neck stand up. (About the only place there are any long enough now!)

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[The Duke]

Bob that link says you should replace you SP every 2-3 years, as they stop giving the protection. A quote, “just because the pass electricity, doesn’t meant they are still offering protection”.

 

[Bob Williams]

Good point Steve, I actually read that in the Link and it rang no bells, thanks for the reminder. Think I’ll look up a new SP.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[Ed P]

Always worth adding a UPS as the first link in the chain to expensive equipment. Although nothing will protect against a direct hit, an UPS will handle relatively near mises of the sort that would blow your TV across the room (seen that happen in Singapore). I have an UPS on all the main kit plus another giving isolation to the broadband.

Although the electrical input to a house is normally underground, the telephone/broadband is often exposed. Even a strike 400 yards away could easily fry an unprotected broadband system and if you were unlucky hit every bit of kit wired into it.

The effects of electrical storms can be very nasty/expensive on today’s house.

[dwynnehugh]

Ed P – Yes, I think you are quite right in what you say and have been looking at some UPSs for them as and when all is repaired. This was a hit on the tel line which took out a few things linked to it, but the mains was OK. Perhaps a UPS would be preferable to a surge protector?

Have been looking at the mobo – can’t see anything out of the ordinary apart from the slightly blackened inside of the Cat 5 socket – so I suspect a new mobo will be the first replacement and then try the CPU and the RAM – though this can be tested beforehand on a different PC.

Hoping it’ll just be the mobo.

The more you meet people the more you understand why Noah took animals instead of humans

[Author]

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