lightning hit PC now dead

[PCBONEZ]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

Which is why phone service disconnects in every town for hours when a thunderstorm approaches.

Spoken like a true ideological theorist with no practical real world experience.
- I've lived in 11 US States, 2 countries, and over 20 cities.
- Not a single one of them did this.

Which is why munitions dumps routinely explode when thunderstorms approach. Sneak voltages.

Spoken like a true ideological theorist with no practical real world experience.
- "routinely" - This hasn't happened in the US since 1926.

Which is why TV and FM electronics atop the Empire State Building are routinely destroyed 23 times annually due to direct lightning strikes and sneak voltages.

If your theories actually worked they would use them there now wouldn't they.

A never ending job is to show linemen why they created surge damage. For example, ground wires were bundled with other wires.

This is done because, depending on what the wiring is, the ground wires reduce cross-talk and/or EMI.
- DUH!

Not going to quote/repeat all that whole blurb of gibberish:

According to NLSI [National Lightning Safety Institute] the ONLY Absolute protection from lightning is a fully enclosed Faraday Cage.
If there are conductors entering and leaving the cage then it isn't fully enclosed.
- This is because the biggest risk with lightening is the induced voltages [resultant from the EMP/EMI] in the general area and the paths those induced voltages take. - Not the direct path of the strike.
-
On grounding NLSI says: "A spectral study of lightning's typical impulse reveals both a high and a low frequency content. The grounding system appears to the lightning impulse as a transmission line where wave propagation theory applies. A considerable part of lightning's current responds horizontally when striking the ground: it is estimated that less than 15% of it penetrates the earth."
- This means that only 15% of a strike is dissipated via a direct grounding path.
- The remaining 85% is dissipated via inducing voltages in surrounding structures.
That is the EMP I've been talking about.

........ surge protection ....... surge protection ........ surge protection .......

GCE [Gross Conceptual Error]
Despite advertising claims and the fact that it helps a little if the strike isn't too close, Surge Protection isn't FOR lightening.

Proper analysis of a failed computer teaches why damage happens and what can be done so that future damage is averted. In most cases, lightning damaged computers are restored - do not fail again. But only when the tech uses good diagnostic procedures - does not shotgun.

Spoken like a true ideological theorist with no practical real world experience.
"In most cases", in the real world, lightning damaged computers are 'beyond economical repair' - aka useless junk. The damage is typically extensive, random, it's diverse, and unique to that machine. There is little or no training value in having a student work on gear with multiple unknown problems. In fact it is DETRIMENTAL to learning because all it does is frustrate the student.
- That's why Electronics schools use test-rig training aids with ONE problem at a time.
- Any respectable, responsible, 'worth his pay' educator isn't going to hand students problems that the instructor himself doesn't know the solutions to, particularly when there may not be a solution.
That is irresponsible and a waste of the students time.

Repairing at the component level is not to fix the machine or save money.

Spoken like a true ideological theorist with no practical real world experience.
- In the real world it's -ALL- about time and money.
THAT should be taught to students as well.
Outside of Academia recognizing "Beyond ECONOMICAL Repair" is a critical skill.

There will always be many who were taught myths by retail advertising.

You mean like yourself and surge protection?

... and why one does not learn from shotgunning.

Handing a student lightening damaged equipment -IS- shotgunning.
- It's shotgunning education.

The computer can be quickly analyzed by simply taking one minute to collect voltage numbers.

Spoken like a true ideological theorist with no practical real world experience.
- One who has never actually worked on ANY kind of damaged equipment beyond simulated problems in a lab and one who has very little real world experience.

.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

Demonstrably false. Some things are a matter of personal preference - you believe your children are brilliant; I believe my grandchildren are better. We agree to disagree to maintain peace; and find safer things to discuss.

I agree that agree to disagree is a good thing.
.
I happen to agree with eguevarae who's contention [and mine] is basically that westom has a head full of ideological theories and no practical real world experience.
- Thus, his/her ideas about how things work might as well have come out of a fantasy novel.
- And thus, he/she is not contributing anything at all useful to readers or knowledge base here.
.

[PlainBill]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

You and your 100 years of knowledge.....

You like numbers? I have one : you have posted 11 times and yet you have not helped the OP a bit .... nobody puts in doubt your knowledge (yet), but the thing here is that a lecture of lightning storms,data centers and surge arrestors is out of scope here ..... not because it is not true, but because it has not been asked for (in the first place) and will not help the original poster,as it is so technically elevated that is out of the scope of the problem ...
Nice improvement in grammar,I must add....but you still need improvement.
Yet all opinions are valid....... freedom of speech....

Demonstrably false. Some things are a matter of personal preference - you believe your children are brilliant; I believe my grandchildren are better. We agree to disagree to maintain peace; and find safer things to discuss.

"Lefty" was of the opinion that an M80 was not dangerous. I disagreed. To prove his point, "Lefty" held an M80 in his right hand and lit the fuse - thus the nickname. Not only was "Lefty's" opinion invalid, it was dangerous.

As another example, Saturday a large number of people were of the opinion that their driving skills were so good they could drive at full speed on I-10 in spite of the thunderstorm. 69 of them learned otherwise an a 2.5 mile long series of chain reaction accidents.

PlainBill

[EGuevarae]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

.... But with over 100 years of knowledge

You and your 100 years of knowledge.....

.... Useful answers always requires numbers - not subjective speculation.

You like numbers? I have one : you have posted 11 times and yet you have not helped the OP a bit .... nobody puts in doubt your knowledge (yet), but the thing here is that a lecture of lightning storms,data centers and surge arrestors is out of scope here ..... not because it is not true, but because it has not been asked for (in the first place) and will not help the original poster,as it is so technically elevated that is out of the scope of the problem ...
Nice improvement in grammar,I must add....but you still need improvement.
Yet all opinions are valid....... freedom of speech....

[westom]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

Rarely today do you read of a house being destroyed by lightning, but every home for miles around as the voltage spread out and becomes "Sneak Voltage," will be affected.

Which is why phone service disconnects in every town for hours when a thunderstorm approaches. Sneak voltages will destroy their $multi-million switching computer.

Which is why munitions dumps routinely explode when thunderstorms approach. Sneak voltages.

Which is why TV and FM electronics atop the Empire State Building are routinely destroyed 23 times annually due to direct lightning strikes and sneak voltages.

A never ending job is to show linemen why they created surge damage. For example, ground wires were bundled with other wires. Linemen would do that because it looks nicer. Wires had sharp bends. Again, surge damage because sharp bends look clean. One even grounded into a flower box on the porch. Some just never learn; always remain in denial.

Some will post subjective claims and call that knowledge. No numbers is a first indication of myths, lies, or deceit. From over 100 years of well proven experience is a reality – with numbers - from the IEEE entitled 'Static and Lightning Protection Grounding':
> Lightning cannot be prevented; it can only be intercepted or diverted to a path which will, if well
> designed and constructed, not result in damage. Even this means is not positive, providing
> only 99.5-99.9% protection. ...
> Still, a 99.5% protection level will reduce the incidence of direct strokes from one
> stroke per 30 years ... to one stroke per 6000 years ...

No protection is 100%. Once we add numbers to those subjective claims - 99.5% protection - then nobody cares about sneak voltages. Telephone COs that can have no damage suffer 100 surges with every thunderstorm. Homeowners suffer about one every seven years. With 99.5% protection by earthing a 'whole house' protector, well, why would anyone entertain those subjective claims? Those are the numbers that say less than 100% protection is virtually 100% protection.

We cannot test a surge protection system. But with over 100 years of knowledge, we know surge damage is directly traceable to a human's mistake. Use appliance damage to find a defect in the protection system Discover why a human mistake made that damage possible. And learn why plug-in protectors even have a history of contributing to appliance damage.

We know protectors inside a building are ineffective. The NIST (US government research agency) is blunter – calls them 'useless'. We know that surge protection means energy dissipates outside a building. We know surge damage is because that energy was permitted inside that building – a human created failure. We know that once energy is permitted inside a building, then that energy will hunt for and find earth destructively via appliances. And no plug-in protector can stop that hunt.

And we know that damage is not from sneak voltages. Damage means currents so massive as to create thousands of volts. Voltages so high as to overwhelm protection already inside every appliance. Protection means earthing protectors from General Electric, Siemens, Intermatic, ABB, Leviton, Cutler-Hammer, Intermatic, or so many other responsible companies.

Responsible organizations describe the only thing always required for surge protection. Planning guide for Sun Server room:
> Section 6.4.7 Lightning Protection:
> Lightning surges cannot be stopped, but they can be diverted. The plans for the data center
> should be thoroughly reviewed to identify any paths for surge entry into the data center.
> Surge arrestors can be designed into the system to help mitigate the potential for lightning
> damage within the data center. These should divert the power of the surge by providing a
> path to ground for the surge energy.

Earthing is everything. Reliable facilities do not disconnect. Do not waste money on plug-in solutions. And fix the earth ground - a human created mistake - if damage does happen. Routine is to have direct lightning strikes without damage. But only when one learns 100 years of well proven science. And learns why damage happens if damage happens. What was the destructive path to earth? Why was energy permitted inside the building?

Proper analysis of a failed computer teaches why damage happens and what can be done so that future damage is averted. In most cases, lightning damaged computers are restored - do not fail again. But only when the tech uses good diagnostic procedures - does not shotgun.

Repairing at the component level is not to fix the machine or save money. Repairing at the component level is how one becomes so well educated as to even learn why a sharp wire bend or an adjacent protector can make surge damage easier.

There will always be many who were taught myths by retail advertising. Maybe 40%. Then viciously deny reality. People my father so loved to manipulate because they could so easily be 'educated' by advertising myths. Same people who avidly deny all reality. Would only believe what they are first told to believe. He said it made advertising fun. The informed readers learn why appliances are damaged, why effective protection always means earthing, why disconnecting is so unreliable, and why one does not learn from shotgunning.

The computer can be quickly analyzed by simply taking one minute to collect voltage numbers. That means doing something that makes no sense until lessons are learned from those numbers. Useful answers always requires numbers - not subjective speculation.

[Per Hansson]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

Yup, lightning is scary like that
The person I spoke about above, where lightning hit an oak tree on their property...

I helped them find broken stuff by simply smelling it, the smell is very obvious...
Things like refrigerators, plasma TV's and all sorts of things where dead
He has a big wifi network that I setup too, with about half a dozen Linksys WRT54GS routers, they where all fine!
Built like tanks is my opinion of them, they sit in barns etc where there is no heating, so +40 in the summer and -20 in the winter, very nice reliability!

Most things I see where lightning has been and poked is very easy to identify, you have a green PCB which is suddenly black and with half of the components blown into little crispy pieces; that's your problem sir

I always replace at the board level when there has been a lightning strike, component level usually just takes too much time to diagnose and it's likely to be several dead components
But if you want the learning experience then replacing on component levels can be good practice...
(And of course if you have insurance use that instead, so you get a new shiny thing instead of some fixed up Frankenstein thing, I'm really not very fond of things that have been repaired after a lightning strike, does it show? )

[EGuevarae]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

I retired from the Telephone company after 33 years of chasing lightning strikes. The Telephone Interface Box outside has a lightning protector built in, but the protector is to save your house from lightning strikes. the fuses inside are to auto reset after grounding out so the high voltages will not enter your home.
BUT, It's there to protect your house, not your electrical devices. "SNEAK " Voltage is what we called the low voltage, high amp current strikes. Sneak voltage will sometimes pass right through the Telephone Company's protection.
40-50 years ago, the power poles at the street were independantly grounded, and if lightning struck the pole at your house the pole ground would take as much voltage as it could, but the rest would follow the power line to your house and usually start a fire on the side of your home. Your pole and your house would take all the hit and your house would burn to the ground and your neighbors TV or lights may not even blink.
Today, the power company bonds every pole to a ground at the pole, but the Cable TV companies and the telephone companies must bonds by law to the power company's ground.
In the past lightning may hit a phone line and the telco protector would drain it away, but with all the utilities bonded together, everybody gets a shock.
Every house for miles aound will get some of the lightning bolt, so no one house gets it all. Rarely today do you read of a house being destroyed by lightning, but every home for miles around as the voltage spread out and becomes "Sneak Voltage," will be affected. Hundreds of modems, or microwaves, TV and motherboards and the like be destroyed.
Unplugging is the only safe way to stop sneak voltage.

I just saw a PC that was involved in a lightning strike a few days ago in the Brawley (South California) area. A lightning hit on a field that is like 1000ft from the affected homes.The PC i checked was...how can i say it...FRIED? Motherboard,RAM,DVDRW,Modem,Video Card all have one or more chips fried.Even the CPU fan was fried. The Processor and the hard drive were not affected visibly and tested on another computer were fine....we just have to put them under stress to find out.Funny enough, the power supply works (i just tested it on another system.The affected system was not tried to be turned on...). House 2 units next to this, a 48" flat screen TV was fried. I have not seen it but owner says it smells like burned rubber (?).The house in the middle of this two was not affected at all. I will try to get some pictures from the affected PC. Diagnostic? Get a new system...take this as an opportunity to upgrade ....

[Bishop]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

I retired from the Telephone company after 33 years of chasing lightning strikes. The Telephone Interface Box outside has a lightning protector built in, but the protector is to save your house from lightning strikes. the fuses inside are to auto reset after grounding out so the high voltages will not enter your home.
BUT, It's there to protect your house, not your electrical devices. "SNEAK " Voltage is what we called the low voltage, high amp current strikes. Sneak voltage will sometimes pass right through the Telephone Company's protection.
40-50 years ago, the power poles at the street were independantly grounded, and if lightning struck the pole at your house the pole ground would take as much voltage as it could, but the rest would follow the power line to your house and usually start a fire on the side of your home. Your pole and your house would take all the hit and your house would burn to the ground and your neighbors TV or lights may not even blink.
Today, the power company bonds every pole to a ground at the pole, but the Cable TV companies and the telephone companies must bonds by law to the power company's ground.
In the past lightning may hit a phone line and the telco protector would drain it away, but with all the utilities bonded together, everybody gets a shock.
Every house for miles aound will get some of the lightning bolt, so no one house gets it all. Rarely today do you read of a house being destroyed by lightning, but every home for miles around as the voltage spread out and becomes "Sneak Voltage," will be affected. Hundreds of modems, or microwaves, TV and motherboards and the like be destroyed.
Unplugging is the only safe way to stop sneak voltage.

[EGuevarae]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

Have you nine year old son edit your sentences for grammar, punctuation, and structure. So you live in a glass house?

The 9 years old kid says that you forgot the comma between "So" and "live".

Nice lecture about the cows. First Climatological Phenomenons and now Agricultural Hazards.... I'm pretty sure the OP is learning a bucket load of things from this thread. .....

[PCBONEZ]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

A cow some 20 feet from a tree dies when lightning strikes the tree. Naive assumptions claim EMF killed a cow. Cow was killed by a direct lightning strike - three miles down to the tree and four miles to earthborne charges. That being a path shorter than 5 miles across the sky. Also electrically shorter is up a cow's hind legs; down its fore legs. Current through the cow killed that cow.

Cow was killed by a direct lightning strike that took an electrically shorter path via the cow. Cow did not have a single point ground. So current passed through the cow destructively. EMF did not kill the cow as so many would have us believe.

Same applies to your locations. Repeatedly is the term single point ground. If single point ground is not implemented, current can pass through household appliances for the same reason a cow was killed when a tree was struck.

EMF does damage when hearsay replaces well understood electrical concepts. For example, if EMF is so destructive, then a nearby lightning strike means every car radio, cell phone, and wrist watch is destroyed. Why are none damaged? A long wire antenna may be many thousands of volts due to a nearby strike. So an NE-2 neon glow lamp is connected to that antenna lead. Those milliamps drop maybe 10,000 volts down to tens of volts. Energy content of nearby strikes (EMF) is that near zero.

Nearby strikes are routinely made irrelevant by circuits inside all electronics.

Damage is due to current from a direct strike. Analysis of failed electronics can define that incoming and outgoing surge path. Both must exist to have a surge current. Analysis (an autopsy) can identify a defect in the ground system. Help define why a building does not have single point earth ground system. Single point grounding is essential for surges incoming from the sky, from utility switching, and from earth. Essential so that a surge is not inside the building.

Surge protection means energy dissipates harmlessly outside a building. Always. Every protector is only as effective as its earth ground. And why a connection from protector to earth must be so short (ie 'less than 10 feet'). Low impedance - another critical factor that must exist in every protection system because energy must dissipate harmlessly in earth.

It is more complex than that.

[westom]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

That is obvious, it might be only a fuse,only a south bridge, only the complete board,only 1 component inside the processor, or all at once.

Have you nine year old son edit your sentences for grammar, punctuation, and structure. So you live in a glass house?

[westom]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

Lightning likes to find a way to ground, yes, but it is more complex than that

A cow some 20 feet from a tree dies when lightning strikes the tree. Naive assumptions claim EMF killed a cow. Cow was killed by a direct lightning strike - three miles down to the tree and four miles to earthborne charges. That being a path shorter than 5 miles across the sky. Also electrically shorter is up a cow's hind legs; down its fore legs. Current through the cow killed that cow.

Cow was killed by a direct lightning strike that took an electrically shorter path via the cow. Cow did not have a single point ground. So current passed through the cow destructively. EMF did not kill the cow as so many would have us believe.

Same applies to your locations. Repeatedly is the term single point ground. If single point ground is not implemented, current can pass through household appliances for the same reason a cow was killed when a tree was struck.

EMF does damage when hearsay replaces well understood electrical concepts. For example, if EMF is so destructive, then a nearby lightning strike means every car radio, cell phone, and wrist watch is destroyed. Why are none damaged? A long wire antenna may be many thousands of volts due to a nearby strike. So an NE-2 neon glow lamp is connected to that antenna lead. Those milliamps drop maybe 10,000 volts down to tens of volts. Energy content of nearby strikes (EMF) is that near zero.

Nearby strikes are routinely made irrelevant by circuits inside all electronics.

Damage is due to current from a direct strike. Analysis of failed electronics can define that incoming and outgoing surge path. Both must exist to have a surge current. Analysis (an autopsy) can identify a defect in the ground system. Help define why a building does not have single point earth ground system. Single point grounding is essential for surges incoming from the sky, from utility switching, and from earth. Essential so that a surge is not inside the building.

Surge protection means energy dissipates harmlessly outside a building. Always. Every protector is only as effective as its earth ground. And why a connection from protector to earth must be so short (ie 'less than 10 feet'). Low impedance - another critical factor that must exist in every protection system because energy must dissipate harmlessly in earth.

[EGuevarae]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

18 years experience is not even half of my experience. Yes, I was designing and fixing computers long before the PC even existed. And teaching techs why shotgunning so often results in confusion. Why electronics fail again if using shotgunning.

If you have that much of experience, you must agree that almost all documentation/reference material of the field is (or used to be) in English.
Being you that wise,It amazes me the poor level of grammar you have.My 9 years old boy writes like that....

Can you please just give us a little light from your more-than-40-years-of- experience-trained-superior-Sherlock-Holmesque mind and try to help the original poster? (<----- note the end of the question with one of those arcane symbols called "Question Marks"...very useful glyph...)
If he wants to know about the life an death of lightning storms or other climatological phenomenon,let him ask. He asked if someone had revived/reused a system damaged/unstable by that conditions, not for an essay titled " To fix,or not to Fix......"

Darn,I think I'm having one of those days .....

[PCBONEZ]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

This guy it thinking like the lightening itself is passing through the PC.
If that happened it would be a lump of molten metal.

Voltage that high even just passing through air has a huge EMF to the point there is an EMP associated with each strike.
A lightening rod isn't going to mitigate and EMP. It will just move it a little.
It is nearly always the voltages induced in -whatever- acts as an antenna by the EMP that damages equipment and NOT that the equipment was in the path to ground.

.

[Per Hansson]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

westom; I love your grammar
Aaaanyway, here are my 0.02SEK on the matter
Lightning likes to find a way to ground, yes, but it is more complex than that

A company I maintain a wifi hotspot for was once hit by lightning in an oak tree close to where they had an office
Some printers died, some other stuff was ok, difficult to find the trace the lightning strike took tho, as you describe one should, since it actually hit a tree nearby and then found whatever path into earth it could...
Stuff in houses 50 meters away was killed, insurance took care of it all
Other stuff in the same houses was fine...

Just a few weeks ago lightning struck a large Birch tree on his front lawn, this time only one single computer was killed
It was connected to an outlet with no grounding
And it was only the motherboard that was damaged...

Now this Birch was actually located right in the centre between most buildings, and not like last time at the outer edge of where he has his buildings, so how and what equipment lightning kills I think is too difficult to say

[westom]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

What these techs are trying to drive the point home is including me cannot trust a unit that was stuck by lightning.

Why surge damaged equipment routinely performs without damage. The failed parts are dots. Connect the dots. In lightning, what was the path from clouds, through each dot, to earth ground. That is where overstessed components might be damaged.

Take something so simple such as a 56K modem. The dot is a PNP transistor. That is typically the only part damaged in a direct lightning strike. Surge path includes current from relay coil to relay wiper. No overstress there. Once a surge path is established, then overstressed parts are identified and replaced.

Meanwhile naysaying tells to the OP to not learn. Do not even try.

That computer is an ideal learning platform. To identify the one part that is damaged. And then know what other parts might be overstressed - are not reliable as spare parts. To have a list of what components are - without doubt - unharmed. In most lightning damaged computers, the computer never failed again. In many cases, the rumored lighting damage did not exist. In many cases, the real failure was a manufacturing defect. Poorly educated techs blamed lightning because the problem remained elusive. Because they never learned basic diagnostic procedures.

18 years experience is not even half of my experience. Yes, I was designing and fixing computers long before the PC even existed. And teaching techs why shotgunning so often results in confusion. Why electronics fail again if using shotgunning.

Most lightning damage is traceable to bad grounds. Any homeowner can fix them. But techs who never learned basic diagnostics procedures will even post cheap shots rather than learn how simple the solution is and why direct lightning strikes need not damage any computer. Fixing the computer properly also means learning why that damage occured - and is easily averted.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

An Engineer with no practical real world experience in their field would be best described as a Fantasy writer.

A trainer that isn't clueless doesn't give trainees problems that aren't likely to have a solution. There is zero learning potential in that approach.

A responsible tech doesn't put questionable equipment back into service in a production environment.

.

[EGuevarae]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

... Fix computers first to learn. Sometimes the part is not replaceable. But in every case, knowledge is obtained. ...

Sorry if I had the idea that after 18 years of experience repairing computers,I could open my big mouth.

And I don't think OP has the resources the 911 center has ....

What is the point? Exactly as Wizard says : unreliable systems.

While I praise your hunger for knowledge (and I really do),I think (as I said before) that you are straying from the main idea here...and honestly this is starting to look more like a Philosophical Lecture about the Quest for Knowledge than a proposed solution or the base to recommend anything (even a "trash it" final decision). You had not even mentioned a possible solution, except one fact : a component might be damaged. That is obvious, it might be only a fuse,only a south bridge, only the complete board,only 1 component inside the processor, or all at once. The OP is looking for a possible solution to an existing problem, not a lecture about the Big Bang theory ...

[Wizard]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

What these techs are trying to drive the point home is including me cannot trust a unit that was stuck by lightning. Especially on one that you have to warranty and on other items that is too critical to rely upon.

Cheers, Wizard

[westom]

Re: lightning hit PC now dead

A 'woe is me so give up' attitude is rampant. The OP should know which part is damaged before scrapping the computer. Often, that is done in minutes with only a meter, diagnostics, and experience. Longer when one has never learned how to do this stuff. A majority have expressed a "stay ignorant" attitude. Historically, a response is to agree with less trained and more numerous technicians. A 'do nothing' attitude.

Surge damage is often a single path through electronics. Surge damage is directly traceable to human failure. Routine is to have direct lightning strikes and no damage. Some here had damage. Then accepted failure as normal. Are posting a 'do nothing and do not learn' attitude. And did not correct the human mistake that permitted surge damage.

Orlando FL was suffering lightning damage to their 911 System. Since direct lightning strikes means humans must fix their mistakes, then Orlando did just that. Fixed the only reason for damage. Upgraded building earth ground:
http://www.psihq.com/AllCopper.htm

Fix computers first to learn. Sometimes the part is not replaceable. But in every case, knowledge is obtained. Was the computer lightning damaged? What was the path of that unacceptable and avoidable surge? In Orlando, they discovered why damage to electronics happened. Fixed electronics. And then fixed the reason for that damage - defective earth grounds. A human mistake.

Historically most computer users will entertain their fears. Believe myths about lightning rather than learn. Therefore do nothing; trash the machine. Listen to a majority of naysayers who also accept lightning damage as normal. One can entertain their fears. Or one can learn from that damage. Direct lightning strikes do not cause damage when a homeowner is informed. Historically, many techs (due to insufficient engineering knowledge) will entertain their fears. Believe and promote myths about lightning.