Surge Protection
This winter many of us have experienced electrical power fluctuations and outages due to ice, snow and wind bringing down electrical lines. Did you know that these outages and spikes caused by power coming back on can damage and decrease the life of your surge protectors? Even though the surge protector is designed to handle these fluctuations and protect our valuable electronic equipment from harm, they can wear out and need to be checked to ensure they are still working. Many have warning lights to indicate loss of function.
If there have been several outages or brownouts or even the flickering of lights in your area, you may want to consider replacing your surge protector, especially if it was an inexpensive model or more than five years old. The surge protectors with higher joules (how much energy the surge protector can absorb before it fails) ratings can handle more surges than the inexpensive ones with lower ratings.
Look for a device that has the UL certification plus equipment warranty and expect to pay between $30 and $100 for a good quality surge protector. The one picture above even has a remote to turn it on and off. After chatting with several supergeeks at a few computer stores, we purchased a 12 outlet 3940 Joules surge protector made by Belkin with a $300,000 equipment protection warranty for under $50.
