Hi all,

Just over a month ago broadband access became available in my area and I signed up immediately. I purchased a new Billion 7404VGP-M router/modem so that my father could use the connection wirelessly on his PC laptop. I also paid the extra money for this model so that I could set up VOIP for my parents and siblings and we have very happily been using PennyTel for the past couple of weeks.

A couple of days ago we had a lightning storm overnight. The bureau forecast claimed there was the "possibility of thunder" so I didn't unplug anything before going to bed. I awoke at dawn to the sound of a strange buzzing sound coming from the corner of the room where the router is plugged in to the phone line. (My parents later told me that they heard the same noise in their room where they have a corded phone attached to a phone line socket).

A clap of thunder sounded overhead and I leapt out of bed to unplug my router, Mac, printer etc. Alas, I was too late! The Billion's lights were cycling through and a few seconds later the lights died. My computer was fine and though I haven't had a chance to test its ethernet port, it seems fine; I'm hoping that the router absorbed the charge of the strike, sparing my Powerbook. I have a $30 Belkin ADSL line filter/splitter installed as well and don't know whether this was destroyed.

Having had the router for less than a month, I now find myself needing to replace it, something I really can't afford to do. Though it is still under warranty, the Billion guarantee doesn't apply in the case of lightning strikes and our home and contents insurance requires an excess of $300 to be paid according to my father.

Do any of you have any suggestions about what I ought to do and what measures I can take to ensure this doesn't happen again? I know I should have unplugged everything but as it happened overnight, I'm trying not to blame myself too much. Any advice would be much appreciated. I'm pretty annoyed about this but know there is not much else to do than replace the router.

Hope everyone here has a very merry Christmas and a safe and happy New Year.

- Henry

Buy yourself a good surge protector. One that can withstand a zillion volts and comes with a ten year warranty plus cover to the value of $50,000 if your electronics stuff does get zapped. There are a couple of threads here about this so do a search and you will get some models and prices.
As to your existing fried router ? Sorry , its cactus and only good for a paperweight now. You just have to buy a new one.

Stewie

Edit: Heres one to get you started...
http://forums.mactalk.com.au/showthr...ight=lightning

Read the fine print against EVERY surge protector.
**Does not cover lightning strikes**

Thats means that $50,000 protection wont do jack.

Not quite true, Simo. Most consumer-grade surge arrestors use varistors, and they're often not quite fast enough to protect against a massive line-strike surge. Onces that use a triac bypass will do the job, but they're not cheap. The famous Clipsal Safety Switch uses the same principle to detect ground leakage and will flip off in nanoseconds.

That said, cheaper ones will do a reasonable job of halting a lightning surge -- I use a $10 inline unit for my phone line (as well as a triac bypass unit for the rest of my room's electronics) and I know it's saved my modem from lightning at least twice.

I was once not so lucky, however -- I had just upgraded to the joys of DSL with an old original SpeedTouch, and had a mains-protected Windows PC and a 9600 hooked into it, when one night we had a nasty electrical storm go overhead and a bolt must have hit a Telstra junction box, because not only did the house phone die, so did the modem, and unfortunately so did the onboard ethernet socket in the 9600. Thankfully that was easily bypassed with an old Realtek NIC, but I had to replace the modem, and we got a new handset from Telstra.

You answered your own question,

But you should have done it before you went to bed. A surge protector might help but I have seen instances of surge protectors preventing modems syncing as they limit the amount of electricity the modem can draw - thus reducing your achievable speed. But if you have a service that is less than 1.5Mbps or are less than 4kms from your exchange you won't notice.

Thanks to all those that have replied so far. It sounds as though there really isn't a "silver bullet" to protect electronic equipment from lightning strikes. I suppose the force and speed of strikes makes them very difficult to protect against.

Having done some more reading online I am now fearful that my ethernet port might also have been fried. I have no way of testing this at the moment unfortunately so will just have to wait until the new router arrives. I thankfully have a wireless card so will use that to access the internet if the ethernet port is dead. Does anyone know if it is possible to replace such a port/card? I have a 15" Powerbook G4 1.5Mhz.

EDIT: I should have added that I also had a cordless Panasonic handset connected to the Billion router with a 5cm phone cable. This survived the ordeal unscathed so I'm hoping this is a good sign - perhaps my Mac won't be affected.

- Henry

I have my computer gear pluged into a basic surge protector and when i hear of the theat of storms i just pull the power plug and the phone line.unfortunately not much manmade can argue with 20 million + volts and god knows how many amps of a direct lightning strike so while a surge protector may sve you from the small stuff unpluged is best.

You can only test your ethernet port with another ethernet device. if you were luckier than I am and the port syncs okay, you're all good. If it doesn't, the only way to fi it is the expensive way -- replacing the motherboard.

unfortunately nothing other than disconnection can protect you from a reasonably close and direct lightning strike.

if you live in the tropics like i do then even disconnection is not a practical solution - if i disconnected every time there was a liklihood of electrical storms i would spend 6 months of the year unplugged!!

dont be sucked in by the marketing spin about surge protectors, they are great for protecting from spikes and so on caused by the power supplier, they will do nothing to protect against a direct lightning strike.

Like Galumay, I have a similar situation and cannot be constantly pulling plugs and disconnecting antenna leads. Our satellite setup was fritzed a few years ago, lightning struck the LNB on our 4m dish, travelled along the lead, wacking the splitter and decoder. At that time about $1k disaster.
Also on another occasion lightning did my modem, also.
Now, I watch the storms fronts on BOM, then listen for the thunder and count the seconds to lightning. When they lessen from 10 seconds, I pull all the plugs... phone, ethernet, satellite, the lot. If I am away from the property for the day, they also get disconnected.
I know this does not help the original poster at all, but it is a successful strategy at no cost other than patience. Oh.. and a bit of crawling about under desks etc.
Happy Holidays everyone!

Like the output transistors blowing to protect the fuses in an amplifier, so does the mac protect the surge protector....Disconnect, Disconnect, Disconnect.

Or buy a wireless router and ship the computer to the other side of the room :P

But yes a surge protector is recommended at all costs

surge protection and UPS shuld be used if one is a serious computer user but as has been said in several threads. Lightning cannot be stopped or insulated against.. however it can be redirected by installing things for it to be attracted to.. as far away from the house as you can get it and .. taller than your house.
This may take the form of trees but I would not recommend that.

Never wait for the clap of thunder .. as sound always comes afterwards.. even if the lightning hits you.. you will be well and truly zapped before you hear it.
Lighting can kill your router/modem from a long way away.. all it has to do is find a phone line and travel along it. When storms are about one should always disconnect the main phone line.. mainly so that no human gets zapped. But also for all the electronic devices in your house.

I was a kilometre away from my home when lightning hit a transformer as I was driving towards it.. man the whole sky and land in front of me turned a bright blue expanding glow that was gone again in an instant.
When I arrived home my daughter said .. "dad the stereo was playing and then it went crack fizzle and started burning!" I said "I'm not surprised".

[quote=AusMac;415504]
Never wait for the clap of thunder .. as sound always comes afterwards.. even if the lightning hits you.. you will be well and truly zapped before you hear it.
Lighting can kill your router/modem from a long way away.. all it has to do is find a phone line and travel along it. When storms are about one should always disconnect the main phone line.. mainly so that no human gets zapped. But also for all the electronic devices in your house./quote]
Quite right Ausmac. I got it backwards and apologise.
Couldn't agree more about the main phone line and realized that when that connection is removed, so are all peripherals (including ethernet).
I have had lightning run like water over the ceiling from one side of the house to the other. Completely covered the ceiling. It was like watching the sea upside down. Lasted only seconds. We are surrounded by 80 ft trees and I was thinking of an old fashioned lightning rod placed somewhere on the property, but haven't looked into it.
Recently a branch fell on a transformer (on a pole about 20 meters from the house). It caused a short and exploded. It was 2 am and the noise and the flash woke us. An orange ball of light illuminated the entire house and in an instant was gone. Our electrics were OK as it was the forwarding leg that was blitzed and at about 6 am I was greeted by 7 vehicles from Energex, who then spent the best part of the day doing repairs.
God knows what would happen to anyone or any cattle out there at the time. Fortunately no-one was.

I'm lucky as i am using an "unwired" modem so all i have is the power plug to pull.