by Joseph Malek

Created on: January 12, 2009

For those of you who own a desktop computer and other electronic appliances, power surges are the biggest cause for the damage of such expensive modes of entertainment and those other things that make our life worth living.

Like it or not, the ground wire that is attached to your utility provider's electric distribution equipment just isn't enough protection for your appliances or, for that matter, adequate protection to prevent your home from burning to the ground.

Yes, lightening strikes near or on your home or a malfunction of the equipment that your utility provider uses to supply electricity to your home can destroy your home and everything within your home. Such power surges can fuse the circuits in your circuit breaker box and melt the insulation right off of the wires that send the electricity throughout your entire home.

Those exposed wires cause shorts and a great deal of heat that does create fires behind the walls of the structure and literally burns out each and every electric appliance that is connected to the electrical system. Believe me, a 50,000 volt lightening strike in the vicinity of your residence can make you homeless or even kill you and/or your loved ones.

I've had more than one television destroyed in that manner in past years and since then I took as many precautions as are humanly possible to prevent that from taking place in the future. The truth of the matter is the fact that you never know when you too might be a victim of such an event.

You can save yourself a whole lot of grief and money if each and every device that requires the use of electricity is protected by a surge protector. I have several in use within my home and I also have a surge protector connected to my heat and air-conditioning equipment. So too, home owners' insurance is your last line of defense against such an event. That is, if your insurance provider will cover the losses due to power surges.

So too, a power black-out can cause the loss of current data if your computer is up and running at the time the lights go out. That is why it is important the have a battery back-up power supply that can prevent the loss of your data by providing power to your computer for a period long enough to save your data and then properly shut down your computer.

More than once in past months my home lost power while I was working in my home office. Yes, I lost time and money as soon as my computer monitor screen went black. Then again, you must decide if the few hundred dollar investment for battery back-up equipment is worth the cost, in regard to your income producing activities. Stay safe and good luck to all of you.

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