Ever have a random thunder storm sneak up on you? Last time this happens for me it blew up my computer and fried everything. Last time for my uncle he lost his cable modem. Any suggestions other than a good power cord to help protect it?

First sign of thunder and my machine gets shut down immediately. I am absolutely paranoid, especially with a new machine. I also shut down and unplug the television, as well. Usually you hear thunder quite a while before the storm gets to the danger point.

Yes, this is a big problem, though I have never experienced it myself (knock on wood). There are companies like Monster and Furman Sound that manufacture power conditioners that are basically professional surge protectors.

I know about them because I have friends with recording studios and all audio equipment they have plugs into one of these units.

There are many models in ascending levels of protection that shield equipment plugged into one of these from large voltage surges.

Good stuff to check out.

I think this tends to worry many of us geeks out there. I remember as a teen a friend of mine was at a computer typing away then out of no where pretty much a storm popped up. Ending up hitting the light pole outside of their house came in blew the TV and computer and threw my friend up against the wall. he was ok but had to replace the tv and computer monitor. For some reason the guts of the box lived but the monitor did not both being plugged into the same power strip.

We have professional backup power/surge protectors on all our electronics. The beauty of carpet cleaning for rich people When some of those offices upgrade they just dump the old stuff without caring its worth $100+ each even beign a couple years old its still more than adequate.

I have had 2 routers go bad after a storm and I hear that it is a pretty common occurrence. So now I have all our computers and related accessories at home (except the printer), plugged into UPS'. The DSL line is also protected by the UPS.

I also lost a router to a storm before.

Oddly, for the last 2 days we've had thunder storms. We NEVER have them here, besides an occasional squall that moves through. I shut down and unplugged everything last night, I'm not taking any chances.

I use to have this happen to me so I bought a battery back up and now when the power goes out the battery power kicks in and it gives me time to log off of everything so it doesn't ruin the computer.