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what method do you use for grounding

i work on the carpet and sometimes i dont even touch the chassis. usually i do, though. i also plug and unplug ATX and SATA power connectors with PCs on and never had any problems either so maybe im just lucky.

with no electricial or technical background, it doesnt seem to ME that the static charge most ppl generate from moving around could be enough to affect modern PC parts. im prolly way off but if a discharge doesnt even shock me how can it affect parts designed to withstand 100+ amps? yea i have no idea how this shit works, but i do know modern PCs handle a LOT of voltage and amps and the minuscule amt of electricty discharged by walking on carpet in yer socks just doesnt seem to me to be capable of doing anything...

<startflame>

btw i've buckled up close to 100% of every car ride ive ever been in. seat belt absolutely saved my life almost 2 years ago and obviously reaffirmed my seat belt addiction.
 
Somnambulator said:
im prolly way off but if a discharge doesnt even shock me how can it affect parts designed to withstand 100+ amps?
Click to expand...

It isn't the amperage - it's the voltage. Even a spark you can't feel can be several thousand volts. Those you see and feel can be 10,000V or more. Very crudely stated, current blows conductors and voltage blows insulators. Either will destroy a CPU, GPU or chipset.
 
mtrupi said:
Drive to Radioshack
Click to expand...

But but..... OK seriously though, I don't need one at the moment. Probably won't for a while.

OK I lied, my case is open right now....

I could get one on Amazon though, through Prime FTW.
 
Somnambulator said:
with no electricial or technical background, it doesnt seem to ME that the static charge most ppl generate from moving around could be enough to affect modern PC parts. im prolly way off but if a discharge doesnt even shock me how can it affect parts designed to withstand 100+ amps?
Click to expand...

These parts aren't designed to take 100 amps on a single pin. There are hundreds of pins supplying those amps to your typical Athlon 64/Core 2 chip.

The key here is, discharge normally happens so fast that it takes only one path. And you have to remember: the voltage potential required to create a static electric shock that you can actually feel is THOUSANDS of volts. So that high voltage creates a momentarily high current on a single pin of your chip, and BOOM, the gate oxides attached to that pin are broken.

But, as has already been mentioned, every pin on your chip has an ESD shock buffer, typically with a couple of huge diodes and some capacitors. But the oxides on gates have gotten thinner, and since chip area is at a premium, the ESD protection hasn't gotten larger, so overall, chips are more vulnerable today than they ever have been (one exception is the 45nm Intel chips - the metal gate results in a thicker gate oxide than Intel's 65nm process).

Yeah, you certainly can damage chips. But even though I'm an EE, I don't use a wrist strap at home (I do use one at work). At home, I find that a grounded case is usually good enough. ALSO, this is key: if you don't touch conductive surface traces or semiconductor pins, you can't damage the parts you are handling, unless you fumble with the part in question. I make it a point to handle items like chips, cards and motherboards around their edges. You can also grip the metal slot cover or fan on your video card to avoid any contact with the chips.
 
Somnambulator said:
i work on the carpet and sometimes i dont even touch the chassis. usually i do, though. i also plug and unplug ATX and SATA power connectors with PCs on and never had any problems either so maybe im just lucky.

with no electricial or technical background, it doesnt seem to ME that the static charge most ppl generate from moving around could be enough to affect modern PC parts.
Click to expand...

I always touch the chassis, and often try to keep my arm resting on it when possible. Some parts can handle the static, and some can't. Unfortunately, all those parts are connected in your computer.

As far as plugging and unplugging power cables while a computer is on, I've done that plenty of times with IDE drives. Had both a hard drive and a DVD burner over the years that I've done it with. Both had started failing, and I got lazy with the troubleshooting, and decided I wasn't going to reboot with each new test anymore. I just uninstalled the drive in windows, took out the power, then took out the IDE cable, then reversed the order for reinstalling. Worked every time with no issues.
 
MB is grounded to case and case is grounded via PSU power cable to a grounded powersurge protected outlet which continues it's grounding path to a grounded recepticle.

The recepticle is grounded all the way back to the a grounding buss bar in the panel then that goes to a grounding rod to earth.

Seems to work.
 
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