> >> Here, I have wood floors, and unfinished wood tabletops, and I normally
> >work in cotton socks. So far, I haven't measured more than 600V and
that's
> >pretty unusual.

Wood is good!

> >600 volts is only about 20 times more than the gate of a typical FET will
> >stand (about 40 times for a typical logic FET). A PIC with protection
diodes
> >would probably survive it OK except on pin RA4 (no upper diode) or
> >equivalent.

> Most devices are ok with it. I wouldn't handle bare laser diodes without
additional protection, and that is my peak measurement so far.

Most, yes. Some, definitely not. An unprotected  FET gate can be about as
bad as they come (tens of volts breakdown).. A Gunn diode is pretty
sensitive too I believe - not that many people will encounter a Gunn diode
from one years end to the next. Most modern ICs are pretty safe at that
voltage with the normal levels of esd source capacitance represented by a
human body. Store the charge from several people to a large enough capacitor
and it may be different. A filing cabinet may qualify. Murphy says that such
unlikely things can happen if its important enough that they don't.

In a previous corporate life time and long long ago (in a universe far ... )
we used to be able to increase shock capacity by having a group of people
hold hands and shuffle across carpet together. Shuffle shuffle shuffle zap
... ! Everyone in the string as well as any target received much the same
level of shock.



        RM

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