680x0's Journal: Damn lightning...

...took out 3 ethernet switches. I only had 1 spare sitting around... Not sure how it zapped them when I had surge suppressors on all the computers and switch power supplies.

So, it turns out, WalMart is the only place open at 10:15pm on a Sunday night with computer equipment. They had some 10/100 hubs (not switches, but good enough for now).

When we get home, it turns out we also need a new dial-up modem (WalMart only had internals, which I intend never to buy). But at least our LAN is back up and running.

But once again steeds.com and our other domains are down for a while (until sometime tomorrow).

Update: I forgot I had a modem in my IBM Thinkpad. It's one of those crappy "WinModems" that almost never work under Linux, but in this case, IBM released drivers. Go IBM! :-) So, for the time being, my plucky little Thinkpad is our gateway to the Internet. (Well, for the static IP addresses, anyway.)

That damned lightning...

[HPTiPete]

...truth is, if it's close enough not much will shield you effectively from that many volts--it just literally "jumps the gaps" going where it will. perhaps some of the more expensive UPS's would offer a better amount of protection? seriously, though, this is the reason to back-up any "always on" servers...and if your power is at all "flaky," lightning storms may be a good time to shut down, unplug (and move the cords away from the outlets), and go play monopoly.

Re:That damned lightning...

[680x0]

Yeah, I'd pretty much gotten used to the fact that whenever a lightning storm happens, I need to buy a new modem (usual symptoms: I can talk to the modem via the serial port, get an "OK" response, but the modem insists "NO DIALTONE" whenever I try to dial out). But I think this is the first time I've lost an ethernet switch to a lightning strike. And, I need to centralize the computers in my house: I currently have 3 rooms with ethernet hubs or switches (so I can connect the rooms with single runs of cat5).