HeelyJoe

Alright, a few days ago a tree next to my house was struck by lighting. We were on vacation, so all of the computers were unplugged from the wall, but we left them plugged into the router. The surge traveled through the modem, then the router, and then fried everything connected to the ethernet port.

So, I'm almost positive the damage is limited to fried motherboards.

Anyway, do you think I should replace the motherboard, or buy a newer one for about the same price as the original?

I just reinstalled windows, so I'm not really looking forward to doing that again, but if the performance gain was significant or upgrade path was a lot better, I'll probably go for a new one.

Also note that the only motherboard that wasn't fried was on my parents computer, even though the ethernet is integrated into the motherboard just like all the other computers. They bought a $30 network card and it works fine now.

Gexx

Newer is better in your situation anyways.

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Grow food in Dirt?Save time eat Dirt!

The Duke

I think you should call you homeowners insurance company

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shiarua

qft

I had someone come into Geek Squad (yes, I work there) to get a diagnostic on their machine the other day. Amidst the thunderstorms we've had recently, their computer got totally fried, including their hard drive ><

Anywho, they were just looking to get some kind of written notice that due to electrical surges caused by the severe weather, their computer had been damaged so they could collect from the insurance company on it.

Not a bad idea.

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Xfire

Bal3Wolf

Ya i agree with duke and you should might even be able to rma it if thiers not alot of physical dammage visable.

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HeelyJoe

Sorry, I forgot to mention that we have called our insurance company, and everything is covered. We took all of our computers to a local shop, and they wrote off on it. So now I just have to get something of equal value.

What would you guys recommend for ~$150? Would there be any significant OC/performance gain?

mica3speedy

your insurance should cover for the cost of a new computer, not the value of your old computer. Take for example, we had damage occur to our really old freezer. Our insurance paid out $1500 for the purchase of a new one. I would talk to them to see what you can do in that regard. Good luck!