[PLUG] Hardware problem

[Derek Loree]

On Fri, 2002-05-10 at 18:31, Richard Steffens wrote:
> One of my machines is set up under a leather topped, metal table. The
> monitor is on a laminate over particle board table with metal legs set
> at 90 deg to the metal table. The mouse pad is on the metal table. (See
> ASCII art(?), below.) From time to time, I'll feel a static shock when I
> walk into the room and touch the table, or even sit down on the
> Steelcase chair that is on a plastic mat over the carpet. Some of those
> times, my computer does a hard reset. Would grounding the tables and the
> computer case help, be a good idea, or a bad idea? 

This sounds like your outlet might not be grounded very well.  Your
computer case is a very good Faraday shield (especially with the covers
on), and any static that hits the case should be dissipated to the earth
long before the electric potential of the ground plane on your
motherboard raises high enough to cause a reset.

However, your ground wire could be capacitively coupled to the earth. 
This coupling will still allow the small AC current required to light up
a tester, but static is not AC, and the coupling may be able to allow
the potential of the case to get high enough to cause the reset. 

HTH

Derek Loree

Please note that I use the word potential (short for electric potential)
where most people would use the word voltage (volts is the unit for
electric potential).  The terms voltage and amperage are not very good
terms for describing the concepts of electric potential and electric
current
> 
> 
>      -----------|-----|
>      |     Mon ||     |
>      -----------|     |
>             C   |Mse  |
>                 |     |
>                 |-----|
> 
> Mon = Monitor
> C   = Chair
> Mse = Mouse
> 
> -- 
> Regards,
> 
> Dick Steffens
> "Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati"
> http://rsteff.home.attbi.com/
> 
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