I’m kicking myself in the pants (again). Over the summer, when I had the circuit panel open and was “into” electric, I considered getting a whole house surge protector, but I didn’t. For various reasons (costs and running out of time), I thought I’d do it “later.” Yeah, right.
I am in constant need of those power strip surge protectors, because I don’t have a whole house protector. I think I have spent more money on those protector power strips than if I had just paid the $80 for the circuit panel attachment.
We homeschool, and the computers in the house are absolutely necessary. It’s amazing that ten years ago, I didn’t even know about personal computers. Now, we have half a dozen and it’s growing (although some are old geezers that I’m ripping apart for curiosity’s sake; what’s in there?). My daughter’s recent acquisition of a computer for her personal use has us running around in circles, because I don’t dare plug it in yet. All our computers must be plugged in to a surge protection device! I just haven’t had the time to make another trip to WalMart and shell out another $25 for another power strip protector! Ugh!
A whole house power surge protector is a small piece of circuitry that you wire into your circuit breaker box. It protects the entire house. Now, nothing is foolproof, because electricity surges– be they from lightning or the power company– are tricky things. But a whole house protector with the additional surge protector power strips at your outlets should protect your electronics under all but the freakiest events.
A good articles on this subject is at This Old House. There’s also a very succinct document here (PDF alert) that I found useful.
From what I’ve read, if you have experience with wiring and working in your own circuit panel, installing one of these small boxes is a piece of cake. Needless to say, if you are terrified of electricity, get a pro to put one in. 
Wed, Jan 16, 2008
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