Tripping

[groovedude]

With my current PC set up....i have all my electrical devices the more important ones plugged into a surge protector.

Monitor, two speakers and the CPU. But the power sometimes trips and the surge protector kicks in to protect my system....do i have too many things hooked up to the power? In the last two weeks it has tripped about 3 times.

Any suggestions?

Thanks
Hemant
lOCATION: Australia

[jmail]

You need to find out how much of a "load" you have on that circuit, before you melt the wires and possibly start a fire. You should not be kicking the circuit out like that. Not only that, but if you've got a circuit breaker protecting it, they do get bit weaker with each time tripped.

Turn the breaker off yourself and go thru and add up all the light bulbs that go out, and any equipment that's off (it's not a bad idea to "map" your whole house/apartment doing that). If you take yourself a plug-in lamp, test each & every wall outlet, also. I discovered some circuits in my house that only have two outlets & one overhead light on them, then there's one circuit with practically the *whole* back half of the house on it, including the kitchen and outside lights! Definitely an overloaded circuit.

'Nother thing, check all your electrical equipment on the circuit and make sure nothings failing on you. I thought we had problems a few years back with a circuit and it was the coffee pot that was going (Mr Coffee II). Turns out, there was a recall on the things because of electrical part defects that were a fire hazard (the in-laws had a house burn down years ago because of a coffee pot). Remember, electricity can kill.

[Sonic Valley]

You shouldn't be tripping the surge protector on just your speakers and comp. I have my gear at this dudes house right now recording their band and I have my comp, two monitors, powered speakers, powered sub and tube pres plugged into a 15 amp circuit. Perhaps thats pushing it but I haven't tripped the power or anything.

Have you tried another surge protector? You can run an entire studio off of 2 circuits so I'm thinking there may be a bigger problem here. Running the few items you mentioned should not trip out a 15 amp breaker nor a surge protector.

[GZsound]

There is no way you are pulling enough current to trip a circuit breaker. The answer must be in what else is on that circuit.

As suggested, add up all the load of all the items on a given circuit, for example, your CPU may pull a couple hundred watts, your monitor pulls a hundred watts, your powered speakers may pull a hundred watts, etc. That load in itself is not enough to cause a standard breaker to pop.

Your surge protector may be faulty also.

Usually, once a surge protector has "done it's thing" and protected from a surge, it is toast. Get an new one.

The power failing occasionally is another subject. You have something on your circuit that adds to the load, like a refrigerator, electric heater, fan, etc. that is not on all the time, comes on occasionally and causes the load to be more than your circuit can handle.

Normally, all the various circuits are listed on your power panel door. If you can isolate which circuit your computer is on, you can shut off the breaker and see what else stops working, which lights go out, etc.

Then you will know to turn off those appliances, lights, etc. when you are using your computer.. If that's possible.

Find another circuit with less load on it and run an extension cord to your computer.

Plug a radio into each outlet, flip the breakers and see if any outlets are on different circuits..the radio will stop so if your power panel is in a different room you can simply "hear" when you have tripped the power.

First, get another surge protector. Like I said, once they trip, throw them away.