Cleaning computers after fire

Dan Jenkins dan at rastech.com
Mon Dec 20 17:17:01 EST 2004


Jared Watkins wrote:
> L.B. MCCULLEY wrote:
> 
>> I would second Jared's suggestion that you view the equipment exposed 
>> to unknown hazards during the fire and firefighting as being on 
>> borrowed time.  

I concur. In addition to the concerns others have brought up regarding 
cleaning components, replacing power supplies, etc., I would point out 
that hard drives often have a small micropore filter on them. If it gets 
clogged, the hard drives fail sooner. You may be able to clean gross 
contamination off the filter, but that may not be enough to provide 
adequate air flow. I have found a few drives have the filter (if one is 
present) in odd locations, such as under the circuit board.

I would definitely get your data archived off ASAP. I would not trust 
using the computers unattended. Thoroughly cleaned, the systems may well 
run for awhile, but I would not feel comfortable relying on them myself.

-- 
Dan Jenkins (dan at rastech.com)
Rastech Inc., Bedford, NH, USA --- 1-603-206-9951
*** Technical Support for over a Quarter Century



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