Good Surge protectors at fair price at Wal Mart

Right now Walmart has good looking small surge protectors at a good price.
This is not a voltage regulator or UPS (backup power supply) but it might save you some money by blowing itself up instead of your TV.
Brand Steren 905-400 Ultra Surge Protector
Joules rating 1050 (bien bien)
9 outlets
Phone fax modem internet protection
Small size not too ugly
Price around 225P or so can't quite remember but I would paid 300 for them!
Now this has the features that I think are important!!


Joule rating of 1050 anything under 500 is junk frankly. In a crude way it is like thinking how much of a surge can I take.
Ground light Good to know you have a ground to shunt too instead of a grounded plug without a ground in the wall. Very common here.
Funtion light It lights up and tells you the electronics are good inside it. If it does get a hit it will die and take the hit instead of what you
have plugged in but the plugs will still work. No light no protections. Got it.

Steren in a pretty good name in the value field.

Get em while they last you know the Wally world inventory recylce time if ever. For you rental folks you can also use it to tell you if you really have a
ground on that three prong wall socket. Many houses here have three prong sockets with no ground connected. Some computer power supplies don't
like not having a ground for example as what could be a problem.


Note phone/cable/internet jacks may or may not be compatible with your cable or phone internet modems. I have never used these here but try it if it breaks
it take it out. Let me know if they work on DSL and Cable modems. I would like to know. It has all the pass thru jacks on the bottom of it. If you don't know
what I am talking about ignore this funtion and just plug your power cables into it and ask your computer friend (give him a beer) what is all this stuff.


Z

Thanks I appreciate this, will pick some up before the rainy season.

Merry

merry wrote:Thanks I appreciate this, will pick some up before the rainy season.

Merry

LOL look at the date. Nothing good stays in stock at Wallly world that long. They come and go.
Do not buy the cheap ones they sell now with 400 joules rating. ONe anything less than 500 joules
is useless and I bought two and NEUTRAL AND HOT were reversed.

Hopefully they will come back.

Z

Silly me, I thought they kept things in stock, I didn't realize they did closeouts like Big Lots.

Merry

So far all I get are generalizations about wht will work here and no difinite answers. So what really works?

What really works about what - surge protectors? Any surge protector over 500 joules will protect most surges. But it's NOT a voltage regulator, which you really need for anything hi-tech because the electricity fluctuates a lot here and also runs at 120 whereas stuff from the states expects 110. That's close enough for horseshoes but not for sensitive equipment.

If it's power outages you are worried about, and use a desktop computer, you also need a UPS uninterruptible power supply. If you use a laptop you may have enough juice in the battery to not need this. I use an 8-outlet voltage regulator from Walmart for my tech stuff.

merry wrote:What really works about what - surge protectors? Any surge protector over 500 joules will protect most surges. But it's NOT a voltage regulator, which you really need for anything hi-tech because the electricity fluctuates a lot here and also runs at 120 whereas stuff from the states expects 110. That's close enough for horseshoes but not for sensitive equipment.

It actually depends on the equipment and your local conditions. I monitor voltage 24/7 and where I am except for the middle of the night it stays around 123/128
but other areas report 133 and such. At night voltage tends to float up as mexico has very poor regulation as I don't think they care. If you look at the power
rating on equipment many will tolerate much higher voltage as they adjust as they are used in multiple countries. My Sharp TV doesn't mind 128 and is rated for
it. As merry said for many of us surge protectors will not work and voltage regulation is needed (those clicks you hear in many houses is voltage regulation going
on) but laptops for example have no problem with higher voltages for the most part. Also be aware many of the three prong plugs down here don't really have a
ground lug connected and that makes most switching power supplies (desktop computers for example) very unhappy as it doesn't have a ground to reference
to. Also high voltage from netural to ground (probably from unbalanced phases, in other words not distributing the load evenly across the three phases) can drive
switching power supplies crazy. So voltage and spikes are not the only hazard here. If you do buy a voltage regulator be sure to get one large enough for the
load and many of them click when they switch so be aware it may not be such a good idea to use one in your bedroom for example.

Z

merry wrote:Silly me, I thought they kept things in stock, I didn't realize they did closeouts like Big Lots.

Merry

No they will come back. Seen they come and go three times. Just poor inventory management.

Z

Zedinmexico wrote: . ...... as mexico has very poor regulation as I don't think they care.
Z

Why do people make such ignorant assumptions?

> At night voltage tends to float up as mexico has very poor regulation as I don't think they care.

Solovino, Zedinmexico was stating a fact about voltage regulation. I think WE care because we have precision electronic equipment that requires the steady voltage available in the US, but equipment made here for domestic use does not - it expects fluctuation. So they DON'T care, and I don't believe this has to do with ignorance simply different manufacturing assumptions.

merry wrote:> At night voltage tends to float up as mexico has very poor regulation as I don't think they care.

Solovino, Zedinmexico was stating a fact about voltage regulation. I think WE care because we have precision electronic equipment that requires the steady voltage available in the US, but equipment made here for domestic use does not - it expects fluctuation. So they DON'T care, and I don't believe this has to do with ignorance simply different manufacturing assumptions.

I wasn't talking about voltage flucuations. I was talking about the "Mexicans don't care" part. And I am "THEY". "We" also have expensive electronic equipment that we don't want damaged. To assume otherwise is ignorant and borderline stupid.

I think this is an excellent opportunity to point out this article: "Smart people don't think others are stupid" excerpted on Lifehacker.com earlier this week.

http://sivers.org/ss

Smart people don't make assumptions about other people.

In my post "THEY" is the government - in Mexico there are only two utilities, both are owned by the government. It is safe to say the government "doesn't care" because citizens here already KNOW it is "buyer beware," you gets electronic stuff you buys the voltage regulators. It's the extranjeros who expect a government to protect them from themselves who have difficulty adjusting to a culture that does not.

Merry

Solovino wrote:Smart people don't make assumptions about other people.

Bravo, good summary of the article I linked.

Merry

merry wrote:In my post "THEY" is the government - in Mexico there are only two utilities, both are owned by the government. It is safe to say the government "doesn't care" because citizens here already KNOW it is "buyer beware," you gets electronic stuff you buys the voltage regulators. It's the extranjeros who expect a government to protect them from themselves who have difficulty adjusting to a culture that does not.

Merry

I doubt there is much you can explain to me about this country so you can save the bandwidth.

merry wrote:

Solovino wrote:Smart people don't make assumptions about other people.

Bravo, good summary of the article I linked.

Merry

You are assuming I opened the link. looks like you are good at that.

Merry, please tell me "It's the extranjeros who expect the government to protect them from themselves who have difficulty adjusting to a culture that does not." is an original thought and I will follow you to the ends of this board.

Oncesubtle,

There is nothing new under the sun, so anybody who claimed that would be lying.

Merry

Solovino wrote:

merry wrote:

Solovino wrote:Smart people don't make assumptions about other people.

Bravo, good summary of the article I linked.
Merry

You are assuming I opened the link. looks like you are good at that.

Actually, it was not an assumption - I googled your phrase "Smart people don't make assumptions about other people" and a reprint of the article I linked to came up.

Yes, I am good at Googling.

Merry

Solovino wrote:

Zedinmexico wrote: . ...... as mexico has very poor regulation as I don't think they care.
Z

Why do people make such ignorant assumptions?

Excuse me but I was a Plant Operator at a Stone and Webster nuclear electrical power generation station and also worked at a coal than oil power generation
station before working at HP for 23 years as a Member of the Tecnical Staff. Trust me they don't care about the regulation of the voltage or it would not
bounce around so much. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Mexico has a very unstable voltage wise power grid and it is the result of how they operate. I get
my knowledge from a voltmeter right now it is 127.4V tonight it will be 131V. I have seen houses with a normal voltage of 133V with swings to 140V. Voltage
varies in most of US or Canada by 2V. Normal swing here is 3 to 5V. I have seen much less technical countries with much more stable grids. It is not just
voltage regulation that is bad. Unbalanced phase loading causes many phases of power to have 3 to 5 V showing which is not good. I am sure if the grid
operators were paid on stable voltage the situation would improve but it is obvious the powers to be feel no need to fix the situation.

Z

Solovino wrote:

Zedinmexico wrote: . ...... as mexico has very poor regulation as I don't think they care.
Z

Why do people make such ignorant assumptions?

Maybe because I have 133V on one leg and 123 on another? Or on the other line 115 on one 126 on the other?

The power is not only expensive here it is dirty as hell. CFE isn't one of Mexico's benefits.

Mainecoons wrote:

Solovino wrote:

Zedinmexico wrote: . ...... as mexico has very poor regulation as I don't think they care.
Z

Why do people make such ignorant assumptions?

Maybe because I have 133V on one leg and 123 on another? Or on the other line 115 on one 126 on the other?

The power is not only expensive here it is dirty as hell. CFE isn't one of Mexico's benefits.

Yes and that is because Mexicans don't care.

I just looked at some of our recent electric bills. 622 pesos for a modern 3000 sq ft home in Guadalajara. 1657 pesos for a 4500 sq ft shop equipped with industrial machinery, most of it 3 phase. Haven't suffered any damage to any appliance or machine nor had any down time in the shop in recent memory.

Solovino wrote:I just looked at some of our recent electric bills. 622 pesos for a modern 3000 sq ft home in Guadalajara. 1657 pesos for a 4500 sq ft shop equipped with industrial machinery, most of it 3 phase. Haven't suffered any damage to any appliance or machine nor had any down time in the shop in recent memory.

And that is a sample of one which proves nothing except it makes yourself a happy person. Others have different results with Mexican grid. Drop a phase or misvoltage
a phase to your three phase motors and you might not be so happy. My power is great here except for the middle of the night when the unregulated grid rises up in
the mid 130s voltage wise. I never said that all people have problems but I would bet most people do and don't know it until.....

Until you watch it day and night you just don't know how bad it does get and I have nice stable power and even voltage for the most part.

Z