Question:
How are computers and toasters alike?
Answer:
Except for the toaster, they both have hard drives and lots of other
delicate electronic parts. But they both do "eat" electricity. Toasters
don't mind the short term "jolts", electrical surges provided
by our electric companies that enter the toaster unexpectedly. With
"choppy" or steady current you will still have your toast. Power
surges don't bother toasters at all.
Computers,
however are "fussy", sensitive to the quality of the electricity
that they are fed by their owners. Depending on the size of
a power surge it can be tolerated by your computer parts or it can
cause one or more of them to be overloaded causing parts to be fried,
to burn out and stop working. Surges that bother a computer
are nothing at all to a toaster.
In
the USA we use AC electrical power. AC means alternating current;
current that pulses. Much of the rest of the world uses DC
electrical power. DC is Direct Current, it does not alternate,
it is steady. Toasters do well with alternating current, computers
are designed to consume ONLY direct current. The moment you
plug your computer into your wall outlet it the first thing that
happen is that the power supply in your computer converts the AC
to DC. All computers actually run on DC. It like those
little black boxes (adaptors) we plug into the wall and then into
our portable radios or other gadgets. Electronic gadgets, radios,
TV's all run on DC. If you can't see the little black box it
just means that it is inside your appliance.
Now
let me tell you about surge suppressors. Their job is to suppress,
hold down, minimize, absorb, deflect or redirect excess voltage from
coming into your electronic gadgets. These gadgets are rated
to withstand a certain maximum amount of voltage. Above their
rated voltage they may burn out OR allow surges to damage or destroy
your computer. If you get too big a surge with your toaster
your toast may come out a little darker.
Ok,
so you MUST have a surge suppressor protecting your computer and
any other electronics that you want to protect. My friend has
a "whole house" surge protector that protects his TV's,
computer network, and his air conditioning system. Everything
in his house is protected from the threat of power surges. All
of the extra current from surges is sent to a metal stake in the
ground that literally uses the earth to ground the surge.
Proper
surge protectors will help to prolong the life of your computers,
but you can do MORE to prolong your computer's life. To explain
further I must tell you about "clean" versus "dirty" electricity.
None
of us want to drink dirty water, right? It could make us sick. What
do we do when we don't have a clean water supply? We either
filter the water or buy bottled water from clean sources or water
that has already been well filtered.
What
about brief power outages? You know, when the lights flicker
or go off for a second or even less. Your computer suddenly
shuts down all at once; you lose whatever data you were working on. Computers
are supposed to be shut down in an orderly fashion; sudden power
losses cause computer crashes and potentially serious data loss.
Would
you feel good if your computer did NOT suddenly shut down during
a brief or long power failure? Well here is a solution that
addresses all of the above important issues and will also prolong
the useful life of your computer. The solution is a UPS. No,
not United Parcel Service. I refer to an Uninterruptible Power
Supply.
Our
UPS includes a battery powers your computer INSTANTLY when a power
failure occurs. The lights may be out, but your computer and
monitor are still working normally. Depending on exactly which
UPS you buy your system will keep running for a shorter or a longer
time. Even with a short time you will still be able to do an
orderly shut down by first saving your data and then closing all
open applications
and then shut down your computer as you do normally.
Your
UPS also does the work of a surge suppressor AND will filter the
electricity your power company is sending you. Your power should be clean
just as your water should be clean. Filtering out the "dirt"
is another job usually well done by UPS.
Want to prolong the life of your computer? Buy the best UPS that
you can afford. It will protect you from surges, keep your computer
running during brief and longer term power failures and your computer
will be healthier because the power will be filtered and virtually
free of the "noise" freely provided by the power companies of america. I've
been using APC brand UPS systems for years, others may be equally good. The
prices have come down a great deal over the last few years.
Go
ahead, take good care of your computer with a UPS. It will
save you all kinds of computer grief and can pay for itself the first
time it saves your hard drive and all of your data.
