Lightning Storm makes my computer to produce sound of a removable device plug-off

[RuskiSnajper]

It happend twice today just hours ago.

The PC was turning on by it self while i was not in the room from sleep, it must have been the very very big vibrations from the sound that shook all the windows, but it may be something else as it appears it turned on by it self after 30 min or so ... no idea, the mobo is kind of buggy in some areas of bios, not unstable but kind of bah.

But throughout all the thunder, when I was on the other PC just in the other room, i heard the win7 sound of USB device being unplugged, like wtf, it wasn't heard from this PC, and it certainly couldn't be on the shutted down one, and I am alone in the house.

Then i came back to the PC, seeing it turned on, logged in, and just as the big lightning flash happens outide (it was less than 3 sec thunder delay so it was close) the sound goes again.

Is this like a fact that it can interfere electronics in such a way or some annomaly ?

[natr0n]

my advice don't be on pc while storm is going on turn it off till storm passes.

I got zapped by lightning that way.

[RuskiSnajper]

It's been going for 5 hours back and forth i don't have anything else to do at the moment

storms can go half a day here, sometimes 2 days in a row, they keep coming back every 30 mins or few hours

plus ... if i had to shut off i wouldn't even be able to watch tv, i have surge protectors for the fluctuations at least.

[Kreij]

Originally Posted by RuskiSnajper

it must have been the very very big vibrations from the sound that shook all the windows

Maybe it shook the mouse enough to bring the computer out of hibernation.

[fullinfusion]

Yeah just the static discharge it the air after a lightning strike can mess with electronics.

I see lightning I shit my pants lol.. I was on my way out west in a semi-truck a few years back and was hit by a direct strike... NOT fun.. I know the tires insulate you but it blew out 8 tires and fried the trucks computer... Good thing for insurance

But either way unplug anything plugged into the computer that can funnel the charge into it...

Power cord and lan wire also the gpu vga cable is what I unplug just to be safe.

[Kreij]

Big lightning storm + Good homeowner's insurance = WIN !!

Years ago I had a 486 that was high-end when I bought it.
It got smoked in a t-storm and my insurance game me $3200 to replace it.

[Irony]

I've got my tv and computer on a power strip and just unplug it when the lightning starts. Fried a whole pile of crap a couple years ago, lit the attic on fire too. Not going to repeat that.

[fullinfusion]

In reality most of the power strips a worthless...

I found that out in Mobile Alabama after I went through 3 tv sets in less then 1 month..power bars suck!

Id recommend a UPS APC unit to handel those stormes without any issues

[Easy Rhino]

sounds like a ghost is trying to use your PC. i would be careful.

[fullinfusion]

Originally Posted by Easy Rhino

sounds like a ghost is trying to use your PC. i would be careful.

I was thinking the same thing when he said he was home alone.... Ya sure about that lol

[theoneandonlymrk]

Originally Posted by fullinfusion

I was thinking the same thing when he said he was home alone.... Ya sure about that lol

Maybe but ive had similar, how good is your mouse mines good and occasionally wakes my screen due to telly noise, and as far as interferance goes I had a mobile a year ago that shut down pcs if called whilst near them and lightning gives off crazier higher powered waves.

[slyfox2151]

Originally Posted by fullinfusion

Yeah just the static discharge it the air after a lightning strike can mess with electronics.

I see lightning I shit my pants lol.. I was on my way out west in a semi-truck a few years back and was hit by a direct strike... NOT fun.. I know the tires insulate you but it blew out 8 tires and fried the trucks computer... Good thing for insurance

But either way unplug anything plugged into the computer that can funnel the charge into it...

Power cord and lan wire also the gpu vga cable is what I unplug just to be safe.

Tires dont insulate you from a lightning bolt, the metal cage around you is what stops you from being shocked ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faraday_cage )


the lightning has come down several hundred feet from the sky, im sure it can travel the extra 2 feet from your truck to the ground with or without contact. :P

[fullinfusion]

Originally Posted by slyfox2151

Tires dont insulate you from a lightning bolt, the metal cage around you is what stops you from being shocked ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faraday_cage )


the lightning has come down several hundred feet from the sky, im sure it can travel the extra 2 feet from your truck to the ground with or without contact. :P

Tell that to the truck with 8 blown tires!

It was a massive strike, everything went white as my hair was standing straight up for a short while after coming to a stop...
All i know is I take cover now lol.....

Originally Posted by theoneandonlymrk

Maybe but ive had similar, how good is your mouse mines good and occasionally wakes my screen due to telly noise, and as far as interferance goes I had a mobile a year ago that shut down pcs if called whilst near them and lightning gives off crazier higher powered waves.

My mouse is ok, I didnt install the driver for it and just use the windows update for it's driver..

Otherwise its waaaay to sensitive for these ol shaky bones

[slyfox2151]

Originally Posted by fullinfusion

Tell that to the truck with 8 blown tires!

It was a massive strike, everything went white as my hair was standing straight up for a short while after coming to a stop...
All i know is I take cover now lol.....

the tires blew due to the massive amount of heat generated when the lightning went through them :P

Tires (rubber) will only RESIST so much electricity before its able to pass through.



its the same as skin.... 10 volts, you wont feel anything as the electricity will not be able to penetrate as the resistance (insulation properties) of your skin is too high, but if you turn up the voltage, eventually it will overcome the resistance of your skin and you will get a shock

Tires may stop say 110/230 volts from a house hold.... but they will have no chance against lightning... all 20 million odd volts

[fullinfusion]

Originally Posted by slyfox2151

the tires blew due to the massive amount of heat generated when the lightning went through them :P

Tires (rubber) will only RESIST so much electricity before its able to pass through.

Thanks for the reminder lol!

You going to cradle me to sleep now after having flash backs lol

[slyfox2151]

Originally Posted by fullinfusion

Thanks for the reminder lol!

You going to cradle me to sleep now after having flash backs lol

Anytime


its very rare to get hit by lightning, but even rarer to be hit twice!.... if thats any comfort? :P


Odds of being struck by lightning: 576,000 to 1

Odds of being killed by lightning: 2,320,000 to 1

of course standing outside flying a kite may incress your risk slightly :P

[fullinfusion]

Originally Posted by slyfox2151

Anytime


its very rare to get hit by lightning, but even rarer to be hit twice!.... if thats any comfort? :P


Odds of being struck by lightning: 576,000 to 1

Odds of being killed by lightning: 2,320,000 to 1

of course standing outside flying a kite may incress your risk slightly :P

lol your the man!!!

Haha I was traveling with the carnival and was asked to work in West palm beach Florida during the winter months... down there you could basically set your watch to the time of day when the afternoon thunder storms would come by...

This chic we nick named Dozer** would get on her hands and knees at the 1st sound of thunder and crawl back to her bunk house... we all laughed at her, but apparently she'd been hit 3 times by a Lightning bolt.... once working a ride, cutting her grass and another time washing dishes in her home lol...

[RuskiSnajper]

Originally Posted by fullinfusion

Yeah just the static discharge it the air after a lightning strike can mess with electronics.

I see lightning I shit my pants lol.. I was on my way out west in a semi-truck a few years back and was hit by a direct strike... NOT fun.. I know the tires insulate you but it blew out 8 tires and fried the trucks computer... Good thing for insurance

But either way unplug anything plugged into the computer that can funnel the charge into it...

Power cord and lan wire also the gpu vga cable is what I unplug just to be safe.

Well i was indeed shutting down everything else and when the lightning happend kind of backed off my hands off the keyboard with chair a few steps back.

I did disconnect all other stuff and TV lines but i kept the net line going since it's on a surge protector as well as the official anti-lightning storm device that I got when they first installed broadband in here. The only reported lightning striking was more than 20 years old and struck the whole neighbourhood, my family had a very very expensive TV bought in Germany (very heavy big CRT) and questionably transported down here (border), the TV survived very long as they don't try to rush and thrown things away, it was repaired many times, though it was the TV they were talkin about storm hit into it and you could hear all kinds of sounds coming from the frying circuits that was going in side they said.


The secnod thing was, it wasn't a lightning storm was close but not hitting the ground in the vicinity, it was strucking up on the hills but it was very loud, however by the sound I knew it was not strucking close, when it strucks to the ground like so when it did last year by blowing up 2 old trees in the small lonely hill just about 1 KM away (prior the big spanning 1500m hills to the south, which are anohter 2 miles away to the south) That had a very very disticnt sound, it was higher pitch and didn't have the long lasting effect of thunder, it was powerful but over fast and just buy hearing it you freaking knew it it's super close.

The biggest thing i hate about these storms here is they keep circulating and coming back and i have to run aroudn the house, but the other thing is, when night falls the circulations are REALLY fast, it comes from southwest and goes to northeast or north, and they go zapping fast, like in 2 minutes 5 big thunders happen and by the last thunder it's already 20 km too far to the north to hear it, it's weird. Because it surprises, once there was no warning shots i heard and OUT OF NOWHERE it just struck big time close, but by the time i turned off everything it was gone.

The other thing is is the another lonely strucks, ah it was just some 10km away it was pretty big bass but it was away, but the clouds just have to be connected and somehow it came back and out of nowhere struck closely, it wasn't that disticnt sound, but it was like 3km after the main thunder was like 3-4 times more away, i heard they used to call some kind of storm like this "out of the blue".


The other strikes i know personally ... they aren't a lot , both of them are surprisingly deeper into the city, as im in the edge of the city closer to the big hills, the first one was very long ago where a storm hit a house directly into the main electrical network and blown out all the electrical sockets 2 meters (that's a lot) out of the walls, so the guy had his house full of wires sticking out of walls like crazy. The other one was at my then friend, times of elementary school, his house was struck and it went into the broadband cable, so .. no idea if the modem threw out but it most certainly did, got a replacement for free i think, but it did damage the PC, motherboard CPU RAM and PSU were all goners, miraclously HDD was totally fine.

That's when i got a first hand experience why should we not buy OEM PCs ... the basic mainstream company for electronics called "big bang" or "comtron" not sure which one of those (or both actally, it was bought in bigbang stores but the PC OEM dealer was comtron, because i saw all the papers they shown me, i think i remember somehow) The PC was fairly budget (compared to my other friends who had more than 1 and all for gaming) and it was a 450€-500€ OEM PC with external graphics for some games so it was possible to play RTSs ... so the warranty repair, get a load of this one, the final cost of the warranty was estimated 1000€ ... how the fuck if the PC didn't cost more than half of that, they didn't had to pay anything, but it was a kind of a trick to show up they had more expenses ... and the PC, it was a piece of crap compared to the original, slow and laggy.

I wasn't that deeply invloved into investigating back then i didn't knew as much as i do now, so now ... i've actually question the fact that mobo CPU RAM got burned out, you know why ... because the Windows installation was intact as it seems , they would have to reinstall ... so it leaves only the PSU to be damaged , no idea it was too long i can't remember if it was the same mobo or not but it CERTAINLY was a lot weaker PC than before, not enoguh ram it was laggy by just loggin in, and yes the computer was turned on when storm hit.

[RuskiSnajper]

Originally Posted by fullinfusion

I was thinking the same thing when he said he was home alone.... Ya sure about that lol

Well im actually at the parents house for some weeks before i go to sea ... while they went on their holidays. The upper appartment is just me but the down one there are grandparents so it's not completel alone.

And ... no it's not ghost, the activity is long gone. Not sure if i should start that part of the long story right now.

[RuskiSnajper]

Originally Posted by slyfox2151

Anytime


its very rare to get hit by lightning, but even rarer to be hit twice!.... if thats any comfort? :P


Odds of being struck by lightning: 576,000 to 1

Odds of being killed by lightning: 2,320,000 to 1

of course standing outside flying a kite may incress your risk slightly :P

I saw it hit twice in the same spot or at least about 5-10 m apart, it was the closes I saw, but not up close, from the house, it was at the small lonely hill beside the recreational walkway around the hill, and there were splinters everywhere, not small ones, like big ones but cut down finely, the whole tree just exploded, but the timber was old too so it was kind of dry orange wood. So that was in under half a year, struck the same place twice, now i know i definitely don't go around there where thers a storm out there, actually, now I recall ... i was running throuh there like 20 mins before the storm, not sure if that was the storm that caused it but still.

[Widjaja]

The Aliens are coming.
First step to World domination, unplug USB devices.

[slyfox2151]

Btw

" Surge protectors " wont stop lightning from breaking your stuff... and can sometimes cause more damage.

they can stop normal spikes you may get from your supply line, but dont expect a brick of plastic to stop a few million volts when a mile of open sky hasnt

[RejZoR]

Originally Posted by natr0n

my advice don't be on pc while storm is going on turn it off till storm passes.

I got zapped by lightning that way.

Technically, if you use wireless keyboard and mice, you can't get zapped by the lightning. Unless you're sitting very close to PC, too close...

[RuskiSnajper]

Originally Posted by slyfox2151

Btw

" Surge protectors " wont stop lightning from breaking your stuff... and can sometimes cause more damage.

they can stop normal spikes you may get from your supply line, but dont expect a brick of plastic to stop a few million volts when a mile of open sky hasnt

Yeah I had that in the back of my mind, im experienced about the mehanics as a kid i was doing all sorts of electro-mehanical stuff and contraptions in friends big truck garage and all other stuff.

The idea of them is to just me to feel better actually.

[RejZoR]

That's also not exactly true. It depends on what kind of lighting strike it is. Indirect strikes are perfectly fine protected by these surge protectors. Direct lightining hits aren't because they in most cases throw the entire electrical installment out of your walls so one surge protection probably wouldn't make much of a difefrence.