Martin Klingensmith wrote:

> Mircea Chiriciuc wrote:
> 
>> Hi
>>
>> I have a long (outdoors) 120m of UTP cable in my home network and 
>> since in a while when it is a lightning storm the switch and the 
>> network card at the ends got fried due to electric shock I think. Both 
>> the switch and the computer are UPS powered devices so I do not think 
>> that there is a problem with the power line.
>> My question is: can I build something cheap to avoid electric shocks 
>> on the cable? To absorb the energy and surge it to ground on other 
>> path than my switch ground connection?
>>
>> Thank you,
>> Sascha
> 
> 
> Consider running a fiber-optic line using media converters or even real 
> GBICs. They aren't that expensive anymore and you will get better 
> utilization of your very long UTP run.

Yes, but he then has to make a long run of fiber.

There are commercial protection devices available for UTP.

You could probably even get away with grounding one leg
of each pair to prevent large inductive pickup for
causing damage since each side is transformer isolated.

BIG 5V AC transorbs to ground for each lead would do the trick.

Robert

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