Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uunet!ncrlnk!ncrwic!encad!dkukral
From: dkukral@encad.Wichita.NCR.COM (Dean Kukral)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apollo
Subject: Re: surge suppressors
Message-ID: <965@encad.Wichita.NCR.COM>
Date: 14 Dec 89 14:11:54 GMT
References: <8912131719.AA18047@richter.mit.edu>
Organization: NCR Corporation Wichita, KS
Lines: 31

In article <8912131719.AA18047@richter.mit.edu>, krowitz%richter@UMIX.CC.UMICH.EDU (David Krowitz) writes:
> I've been looking into buying a surge suppressor for the
> DN4000 I have at home, and they seem to range in price
> from $15 to $150. They all seem to have the same basic
> features (both common mode and differential mode (ie.
> protecting both "hot" to ground and "common" to ground)
> protection), so why do the prices vary so much? 
> Anyone got a recommendation as to a particularly good
> brand to buy?
> 

An EE friend of mine thinks that surge suppressors in this price range
are not worth alot.  We had reliability problems with our Apollos and
tried surge suppressors, hoping they would help.  We paid about $100
each and got the kind with the drop-out protection, i.e. when the
electricity went off, the surge protector stayed off.  The idea was that
when the electricity came back on, it had a surge which was the real
cause of most of our problems.

After installing the surge suppressors, it seemed like we had less
trouble.  However, about that time the DN3000's started coming in, and
then we took part in Mentor's upgrade program to upgrade all of our
nodes to DN3000's.  The newer nodes have been much more reliable, and
I doubt that it was the surge suppressors that did it.  We still use
the surge suppressors, though - just in case they do some good.  They
are cheap compared to the cost of down-time.  And they are a one time
only expense.
-- 

Dean Kukral,  NCR Peripheral Products Division, Wichita, Kansas
dean.kukral@wichita.ncr.com