Tim Shoppa wrote:
> > >And I just learned that it was safe to tuch motherboard/cards when your
> > >computers on! (BTW, any one know aout DIMM stuff?)
> > Actually, I find most precautions such as anti-static and so forth to
> > be baloney. I must have done every illegal thing in the book, and the
> > only things I haven't gotten away with was plugging chips in
> > backwards (by accident). When I was upgrading RAM in the machines in
> > my school's MacLab, the person in charge of it constantly looked over
> > my shoulder and bleated, "Touch the case again, Max. I want to SEE you
> > touch the case. OK, now gently, gently, now. Oooh! Yeesh! DON'T touch
> > those chips!",etc.etc. I didn't damage anything, but he thinks there
> > is a problem even with touching the actual plastic case of the chip.
>
> I've seen sites where the admnistration decided that every user must ground
> themselves on a special several-hundred-dollar anti-static discharge pad
> before they would be allowed to even touch a computer keyboard. I think
> the anti-static-equipment salesman did a really, really, good job on these
> folks
Any of the static prevention steps apply to prevent accidental discharge, but
not everyone has a natural capacitance that allows them to store and discharge
static electricity. I work with all types of components that could be damaged
and have never even seen a spark or a damaged item. My wife touches anything
and kills it. Of course the humidity factor is also important. In a heated
house in the middle of winter there is a great chance of ESD where summer after
heavy rains with 99% relative humidity lowers all of these factors by a number
of times.
The whole idea of all of this (other than someone making a buck on antistatic
items) is to prevent the POSSIBLE discharge of electrostatic electricity into a
device that could be damaged by such a jolt.
Now when I was changing electrical initiators/igniters on 2000 Short Range
Attack Missile electro-explosive devices, I didn't even try to see if I was
prone to static discharge - I just wore the straps and did the proceedures. The
end result of being wrong was a bit more than a dead semiconductor.
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Russ Blakeman
RB Custom Services / Rt. 1 Box 62E / Harned, KY USA 40144
Phone: (502) 756-1749 / Data/Fax:(502) 756-6991
Email: rhblake_at_bbtel.com or rhblake_at_bigfoot.com
Website:
http://members.tripod.com/~RHBLAKE/
* Parts/Service/Upgrades and more for MOST Computers*
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Received on Sun Mar 15 1998 - 13:54:28 GMT