The most naïve often recommend a UPS as superior to power strip protectors. Hearsays says so even when manufacturer numbers define a UPS as near zero surge protection. Most people ignore facts and numbers. Too many people are ‘experts’ only using observation and sales brochures.
Moronic is ‘know’ only from observation.. Protection for every building from homes to Air Force bases is similar. Either the earthing is sufficient. Or lightning will go hunting inside a building for bombs, computers, or dining room tables. Routine is to have direct lightning strikes with zero damage - in FL. But only when a human first learns 100 years of well proven facts.
For example, one FL home was struck repeatedly on an outside wall. So they installed lightning rods. Lightning struck the same bathroom wall again. That wall contained plumbing connected to deeper limestone. Lightning is not capricious as cited by many educated by observation. Lightning obtains a best connection to deeper and more conductive earth. Higher lightning rods were connected to eight foot ground rods only in sand - inferior earthing.
BTW, another myth is that lightning strikes the highest objects. Reality. Lightning strikes the best connection to earth. Surges seek earth ground.
A solution was obvious to those whose knowledge was not based only in observation. Lightning rods were earthed with longer earthing electrodes into limestone. Lightning damage stopped when lightning took an electrically shorter path to earth via better grounded rods.
Damage is always about where that energy dissipates. Damage to telco COs averted because telcos use better earthing. Because every wire in every cable connects short to single point earth ground. And protectors are up to 50 meters distant from electronics. Separation is also important. FL homes that do same suffer surges – even direct lightning strikes - without anyone knowing a surge even existed. Protection is routine when one uses more than observation to ‘know’.
The educated (people who learned concepts taught in junior high science) know that observation only teaches something when underlying science and principles are understood. Classic junk science reasoning - speculation only from hearsay and observation - is not knowledge. Those principles were known even 100 years ago.
Ham radio operators are homeowners at greatest risk. Those who learned concepts BEFORE knowing anything describe well proven science:
http://www.harvardrepeater.org/news/lightning.html
> Well I assert, from personal and broadcast experience spanning 30 years, that you can design a system that
> will handle *direct lightning strikes* on a routine basis. It takes some planning and careful layout, but
> it's not hard, nor is it overly expensive. At WXIA-TV, my other job, we take direct lightning strikes nearly every
> time there's a thunderstorm. Our downtime from such strikes is almost non-existant. The last time we went
> down from a strike, it was due to a strike on the power company's lines knocking *them* out, ...
> Since my disasterous strike, I've been campaigning vigorously to educate amateurs that you *can* avoid damage
> from direct strikes. The belief that there's no protection from direct strike damage is *myth*. ...
> The keys to effective lightning protection are surprisingly simple, and surprisingly less than obvious. Of
> course you *must* have a single point ground system that eliminates all ground loops. And you must present
> a low *impedance* path for the energy to go. That's most generally a low *inductance* path rather than just a
> low ohm DC path.
In FL, informed builders and homeowner install Ufer grounds. Originally developed so that direct lightning strikes to munitions dumps cause no damage. Routine in FL homes to have direct lightning strikes without damage. But many FL homeowners are moronic -remain in denial. A 'woe is me' mentality based only in observation that 'knows' damage is acceptable. Nonsense. Only a quitter knows everything from observation and by not learning well understood principles. Routine is to have direct lightning strikes - and even the protector is unharmed. But that means spending less money on protectors designed for protection system. That means ignoring myths that recommend high profit UPSes and power strip protectors for protection.
Neither lightning rods nor protectors are protection. These are only connecting devices. If not connect to protection, then these are ineffective. Lightning rods and protectors must connect as short as possible to the only thing that provides protection - earth ground. Every wire inside every incoming cable must connect to earth before entering the building.
Most lightning strikes are to household appliances. A lightning strike to AC wires down the street is a direct lightning strike to every appliance. Surge damage is routinely averted by earthing a 'whole house' protector. A device that costs about $1 per protected appliance. A device that is only as effective as its earth ground.
Protection is always about where energy dissipates. That APC protector recommeded by the OP is a scam - a $3 power strip with ten cent protector parts selling for obscene profits. Either energy is connected and absorbed harmlessly in earth. Or a surge will go hunting for appliances and dining room tables destructively. Protection always means no energy inside the building – homes, telephone Cos, munitions dumps, or Air Force facilities. A protector or lightning rod is only as effective as its earth ground - which that APC does not have and will not discuss. Even Franklin demonstrated the concept in 1752. A protector is only as effective as its earth ground.