While troubleshooting a friend's Gateway system about 4 years ago (486
machine), he had similar symptoms and it turned out to be poor ground.  He
lived in a trailer with only a steel grounding rod...we drove a proper
copper spike to depth per code and system worked fine (except Conner hard
disk damaged from repeated spikes and hard restarts).
~Martin

-----Original Message-----
From: PCBUILD - Personal Computer Hardware discussion List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Herbert Graf
Sent: Tuesday, February 27, 2001 10:00 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PCBUILD] Static Discharge


> A client of mine is complaining about a static discharge from his
> system. He gets a static shock from his mouse periodically and
> the system reboots frequently. I have never heard of this, let
> alone troubleshot. Does anybody have any experiences?
> Any information is appreciated.

        Hmm, not a good sign. I have often seen this in systems where the
ground
wire was not properly connected and the neutral was floating above 0V WRT
ground. If this customer has connected their computer to a home stereo and
noticed hum this is very likely the problem. I'd check the cabling to the
computer, make sure the ground is actually connected to ground. It could be
a faulty cable or even a faulty power supply.
        Why I say it's not a good sign is because it is a potentially lethal
case.
The computer case is SUPPOSED to be connected to ground, and the designers
designed it as such. Therefore if some fault happened in the power supply
and the ground connection WASN'T there is the possibility of the voltage of
the hot wire (120V in north america and 220 in most of the rest of the
world) appearing on the system case! NOT GOOD. Hope this helped. TTYL

                         PCBUILD's List Owner's:
                      Bob Wright<[log in to unmask]>
                       Drew Dunn<[log in to unmask]>

                         PCBUILD's List Owner's:
                      Bob Wright<[log in to unmask]>
                       Drew Dunn<[log in to unmask]>