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Just lost a whole afternoon to a bad power strip
Had a weird issue where a customer's PC would randomly reboot. Spent 3 hours swapping parts before I finally checked the cheap power strip they were using. It was causing voltage drops. I should have checked it first, but I assumed it was fine. Anyone have a go-to brand for power strips they trust for workstations?
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black.oliver17d ago
on "it ran fine for years" - i get what you're saying but that's kinda the problem right there. people see a power strip that works and think it's fine til it isn't. i had a customer once who used this old beige strip from the 90s with surge protection that had long since fried out. thing still passed power but offered zero protection. those cheap strips don't always fail in a dramatic way either. sometimes they just slowly degrade and you get these weird intermittent issues that drive you nuts trying to track down.
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michael8032mo ago
Ever wonder why we always assume the power strip is fine? I've seen that same voltage drop issue kill a whole network rack because someone used a dollar store strip. It's not just about the brand, it's about checking the simple stuff first. You'd check the cable on a lamp, right?
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fionat552mo ago
Oh man, that's the tech version of "it ran fine for years until it burned the house down." Sure, your cheap strip might work until the day it turns your fancy gear into a very expensive paperweight. I've seen a power bar so flimsy it got warm just plugging in a phone charger. Checking that stuff first is like looking both ways before crossing the street, it's just basic sense.
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