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"Yesterday, with a loud concussion that shook the windows, a
transformer appears to have blown near our house. (I'm not morally
convinced it was a transformer, since power was restored in about an
hour, which seems too fast.)"
Actually, an hour may be quite reasonable if all that blew on the grid
was a transformer. Such situations are rather spectacular, but fairly
often it is a "pull & replace" job with little else to do. I saw one
of these go off in El Segundo a few years ago--and the outage was also
about an hour. Electric utilities keep spares ready at hand for just
this sort of occasion.
"But all our computers survived because they were hooked into APC UPS
units. (Most of the other valuable electronics is only plugged into
garden-variety surge suppressors, since we don't need to keep it
operating until we can shut it down.)"
The "garden variety surge suppressors" are often worse than useless.
Many use very cheap technology that often fails with the first voltage
spike--but gives no clue that it is gone, still passing current that
you *think* is being protected when it is not. Treat cheap surge
suppressors as what they really are--glorified extension cords--to be
on the safe side.
One thing most folks don't put decent suppressors on, though, that
they should--network lines. You spoke of APC...they offer an equipment
replacement warranty for equipment taken out when attached to their
UPS products. I haven't checked recently, but several years ago their
amount was doubled if the computers involved also had APC surge
suppressors on their network lines.
This makes great sense, since surges can come in through the network
as well (unless you are fortunate enough to have fiber optic network
to the house). A failed power supply on your network locally, too, can
under some conditions shoot a spike to the other machines through the
Ethernet connection.
By the way, a laptop *is* essentially operating on a UPS when it is
plugged in. Its own switch and battery combination gives it more
protection than a desktop from the get-go.
When you had the monitor attached to unswitched power and plugged in
through the video cable to your laptop, though, you were taking a
risk. A surge or spike in the monitor could travel through the video
cable and from there damage your laptop. You were fortunate it didn't
happen--but in future I suggest your decision about what equipment
"merits" being UPS attached should include the monitor attached to
your main machine.
David
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