To Buy or Not to Buy a Surge Protector

My previous laptop did not survive a power surge. I was working on it when it simply powered off and I felt the smell of burned plastic. It was three and a half years old and had plenty of life in it still. It went too early and it was treated rather nicely. Needless to say, I was upset. To this day, I am not certain what caused it to quit all of a sudden – typically this is a failed motherboard and nine times out of ten this is caused by uneven power, power surge or an electrical spike in voltage.

This hub will not address this or that brand of surge protectors and try to convince the readers to rush to the store and start getting them. They do seem to help. After this incident, I purchased a new laptop and an accompanying surge protector which was a Euro version and only fit one item – it was small and portable and super convenient. It worked on 220V which did the job just fine. This lasted about 2 years until a persistent cooling problem destroyed my current system. It is still somewhat usable for about 15 min then it shuts off and this working interval drops to almost nothing. I had it tested and the problem appears to be with a sensor on the motherboard controlling the fan or some other cooling function. This laptop only lasted two years and so far the hard drive is not damaged so getting the information from there is no problem.

I am on my third system now. I chose a matte screen laptop this time and boy I had to pay for it rather dearly. It is all glossy screens or nothing now! This was a $900 computer while comparable with glossy screens were around $500! Either way, the moral of the story is that portable computers are becoming more and more prevalent. They also seem to last less and less. I am wondering if we should all simply take advantage of the online storage options and avoid storing dear files and memories locally.