Computer destroyed by lightning

[Yuriman]

I've never lost any hardware to a lightning strike before, so I'm trying to make sense now of what is possibly damaged, and what isn't.

What happened:

Yesterday I was soldering, when lightning struck relatively close by outside. I heard a "click" in my PC and it powered down. It's on a power isolation transformer, so I couldn't imagine lightning having done anything to it. Nonetheless, I was unable to get it to power on. I tried unplugging the power supply from everything, giving the caps time to discharge, and plugging it back in, but nothing. My wife's computer, which had been plugged in but turned off, from the same outlet but not on the isolator, booted up fine and apparently had no problems. All of the screens worked fine too.

I swapped my power supply into her PC, and found that it booted up. I swapped hers into mine and couldn't get it to power on at all. It occurred to me to check the router (Asus RT-N66U), which I found bootlooping. It's plugged in on the other side of the house, with a 75ft ethernet cable running to mine and my wife's computer. Resetting the router didn't help, but after leaving it unplugged for 15 minutes or so it booted up fine. So... I assume the surge must've come in through the cable line, passed through the modem without damaging it, through the router and caused some minor damage, because it occasionally bootloops now and needs to be left unplugged to cool off, through the ethernet cable into my PC and fried the motherboard, but not my wife's, which was off at the time but also connected.

???

What's weird is that none of the surge protectors tripped. The one the router and modem are on is a nice one and my wife's computer is on a no-name walmart power strip. The modem wasn't damaged. The router suffered incomplete damage, but my desktop appears to be dead despite having been behind the most protection and sharing an outlet/ethernet connection with my wife's PC.

I haven't stability tested the power supply yet. The motherboard I can't get anything out of. The RAM seems to have been slightly damaged because it caused a bluescreen in my wife's computer after a few hours, though I plan to memtest it to make sure it's not just a compatibility problem. Hard drives appear fine. No idea on the videocard yet because I have to pull my watercooling off. CPU ??? I don't have any other 1155 machines in the house, just an 1156 and an FM2. What's the likelihood my 3570K survived, given everything else?

What should I do? Purchase another 1155 board and hope the 3570K is still fine?

 

[pcgeek11]

I've never lost any hardware to a lightning strike before, so I'm trying to make sense now of what is possibly damaged, and what isn't.

Snip~

All of these parts were purchased through Newegg, which doesn't seem to have the same warranty they used to have, so I'm probably SOL for free replacements.

What should I do? Purchase another 1155 board and hope the 3570K is still fine?

1. You cannot say that any more. Lightning got you.

2. Why on earth would they warranty an item that was damaged by lightning? That is probably why they have changed their policy. They got tired of getting screwed.

I have seen this many times where one PC gets it and another doesn't many times. Most likely the motherboard took the hit and all other components are fine.

 

[mikeymikec]

Most likely the motherboard took the hit and all other components are fine.

I could see this being a more likely possibility if the shock came down say the network cable from the router, but otherwise I would expect the PSU to have been toasted as well.

 

[Blain]

I wouldn't trust any of the components after such a surge.
I'd keep all the operable parts as emergency spares, scrap the dead ones and build or buy a fresh 1150 rig.

Installing a Delta Surge Package would also be on my "to do" list.

 

[mikeymikec]

@ Blain

If they're operable, then surely trust them? I think it's pointless to put components into a grey category if "it appears to work but I don't trust it", IMO it results in keeping hold of more kit that you're probably never going to use.

 

[Blain]

@ Blain

If they're operable, then surely trust them?

I think it's pointless to put components into a grey category if "it appears to work but I don't trust it",

IMO it results in keeping hold of more kit that you're probably never going to use.

* Not for everyday ongoing usage. Thus the term... "emergency spares"
* I think these "grey category" components can fill a certain roll, such as emergency spare parts.
* I have plenty of room to store a few questionable components.
Their usefulness can always be revisited at some future time. I would not take them with me, should I reside at a retirement facility many years from now.

 

[Matt1970]

Lightning produces one hell of an electromagnetic field than can wipe out stuff that isn't even plugged in.

 

[Yuriman]

Ran memtest on the RAM last night and it appears actually to be fine, which makes me feel a bit better about the CPU but question the code 50 BSOD I got from my wife's PC yesterday. I'm hoping it was an isolated incident. However, I plugged in a USB wifi dongle and tried to set up internet connection sharing so I could have WiFI for my phone while I wait on a new router to arrive, and I got an error message "could not enable internet connection sharing". Also, Windows Firewall appears to not be working either, and crashes when I try to open it. I think I'll try a reformat and hope that nothing physical is damaged with the onboard LAN.

Recommend me a relatively low-cost surge protector that will protect the cable coming in from outside the house?

@pcgeek, I'd rather not discuss ethics in the abstract. I'm not planning on attempting an RMA with anything. To prevent further discussion of it I'm taking that part out of my OP.

 

[Ketchup]

Lightning is picky, and very precise.

You would not have product warranty anyway, so I wouldn't worry about that. The only warranty that could help is home-owners insurance, but the deductible may be high enough that it isn't worth messing with.

 

[John Connor]

How do you know when those lightning arresters go out? Do they have an indicator light?

 

[Blain]

Recommend me a relatively low-cost surge protector that will protect the cable coming in from outside the house?

Installing a Delta Surge Package would also be on my "to do" list.

Those components can be purchased for about $100 shipped (searching via Google), which is relatively low cost for protecting your household electronics.

It's a given that a direct lightning strike will fry electronics no matter how well protected.

 

[chusteczka]

I have lost a newly purchased cable modem due to a lightning strike that traveled down the coaxial cable. Since then I got a surge protector with coax protection.

BELKIN BE112234-10 10 ft. 12 Outlets 3996 Joules Home/Office Surge Protector w/Phone/Ethernet/Coax Protection

 

[Cerb]

I've never lost any hardware to a lightning strike before, so I'm trying to make sense now of what is possibly damaged, and what isn't.

Try it and see, and assume anything with quirky behavior got damaged, just not fatally.

It's on a power isolation transformer, so I couldn't imagine lightning having done anything to it.

Either by not coming through that way, or jumping across it. Usually, lightning comes via networking, these days, IME, since those long Ethernet cables, and cable lines outside, are such nice inductors, usually with minimal grounding.

What's weird is that none of the surge protectors tripped.

Not weird at all. Surge protectors sometimes protect from lightning, sometimes don't. You can't tell. Most of what surge protectors protect your gear from is far lower voltage than lightning. Surge suppression being normal is half the reason our electronics today are so stable and reliable, less so anything to do with Thor visiting.

That said, this might not be a bad thing to have installed:
http://www.amazon.com/APC-PNET1GB-Pr...dp/B000BKUSS8/

What should I do? Purchase another 1155 board and hope the 3570K is still fine?

Pretty much. Most of the time, the CPU is fine. Usually, the CPU ends up "not fine" when the PSU decides to go down fighting, and you'll hear something a lot louder than a click.

 

[Yuriman]

Thanks for the advice all, very helpful. I hadn't considered that simply by having long ethernet cables, I'd be susceptible to damage. I think I'll move the router close to the PCs, put it on my isolator, use short cables, and get one of those protectors between the router and modem (which will remain a long ethernet cable). More than that is probably unreasonable, as I'm in an apartment.

I reinstalled Windows on my wife's PC and so far no quirks.

 

[Cerb]

Having lightning strike right nearby is what makes you really susceptible to damage . Any surge protection you can afford decreases your odds of having equipment damaged, and is a good thing, but it's practically impossible to be 100% safe from a lightning strike, so don't go overboard (unless this is a regular occurrence, of course).

 

[Yuriman]

Having lightning strike right nearby is what makes you really susceptible to damage . Any surge protection you can afford decreases your odds of having equipment damaged, and is a good thing, but it's practically impossible to be 100% safe from a lightning strike, so don't go overboard (unless this is a regular occurrence, of course).

Hopefully won't be living in Florida too much longer.

 

[Yuriman]

Wife's PC BSOD'd again, but I'm not certain it's hardware damage.

0x000000f7 (0x0040c94273f71eae, 0x0000c94273f71eae, 0xffff36bd8c08e151, 0x0000000000000000)

Since I've been using it, I downloaded the most recent AMD beta video card drivers and may have made a few other software changes that I can't remember. Certainly a few Windows Updates. Anyone help with this?

 

[John Connor]

https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110513152324AAq2Wum

 

[Yuriman]

https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110513152324AAq2Wum

Not really applicable. Not overheating, no new hardware, fresh Windows installation with basically only drivers. Only thing I can think of is the AMD release candidate driver, and I've found no reports of it causing BSODs. I just rolled back to 14.4 so we'll see if that does anything.

 

[pcgeek11]

@pcgeek, I'd rather not discuss ethics in the abstract. I'm not planning on attempting an RMA with anything. To prevent further discussion of it I'm taking that part out of my OP.

I didn't bring it up. You did.

I'm over it already.

 

[Yuriman]

Had another BSOD overnight, 0x0000000a. I'm pulling the RAM from the destroyed computer out to see if it stops crashing. It passed 16 hours of memtest but I've had faulty memory slip past that test before.