Initially he was accused of being an ungrateful old Grinch who didn’t appreciate what was being gifted to him. He was all set to ruin Christmas with his negativity and lack of Christmas spirit. It’s a nice big machine too, massive RAM, 3TB hard drive, dedicated graphics card and more USB and HDMI connections than you can poke a stick at. He or James as I know him, is a client of mine. A corporate banking gaming enthusiast who had lusted after the very machine he had been gifted for months, yet refused to use it. Why?

The reason was not that he was a Grinch, he loves Christmas! (I know this by the multiple Christmas hats I have seen him wear in the few months leading up to Christmas, he was like Buddy from the movie Elf!) It wasn’t that he is ungrateful, in fact he couldn’t stress enough how excited he was to finally have the computer he wanted for so long, which further confused his family when he still refused to plug it in. So what was the reason for his refusal to plug it in? The reason was me. Yip, I am the Grinch who stole Christmas. The End.

Jokes, I’m not the Grinch – honest. The reason James wouldn’t plug it in was because we had a conversation a week before Christmas about installing a surge arrester at his home. I had shared a story of another client whose property had been subjected to a surge just a day or two before. That client lost everything dear to him including his TV, sound equipment, some LED downlights and a couple of other things. More notably he lost his computer/s in his home office which, being a graphic designer, was his livelihood and that was just devastating for him.

A surge arrester is a device that protects electrical power systems from damage caused by lightning or an overvoltage caused by a fault in the supply authorities’ grid. A typical surge arrester has both a ground terminal and a high-voltage terminal. When an overvoltage surge travels from the power system to the surge arrester, which is conveniently positioned before the outgoing circuits in the property, the high voltage current is sent directly to the ground (earth) to avoid damaging the system or equipment plugged into the circuits. In laymen’s terms it is “arrested and sent down”

Surge arresters often take less than an hour to install, and are a fraction of the cost of James’s new computer. It is highly recommended that a surge arrester is installed if you have electronic equipment in your home or office. It is especially worth considering if there was an influx of new electronic equipment in your home over Christmas.

What about James I hear you say? Well, James was so anxious to dive into his new computer and kick some backside on COD (or whatever it is they are all playing now) I have since installed a surge arrester at his place and he is now comfortably, and safely playing his new computer with peice of mind. Come to think of it, I haven’t heard from him in a while……………… Good on ya James!

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