Do you use any device to protect your computing equipment from power surges?

I use a lead with surge protection built in.

Yes use an extension lead with surge protection.

the only one i have that works, came with my APC battery back up for computer. the rest i bought here are very poor quality.

If you use a UPS (Uninterruptible power supply), these have a built in surge protection and if you are not using a laptop can save corrupting your data if the power cuts out (which never happens in Thailand!)

I have seen these for sale in Udon and are a good buy.

Its better to be safe than sorry!!

I use a UPS with power surge protection built in, bought it in Big C for around 1,500 bht some years ago and it's still working well, doesn't give very long power support time (around 20-25 mins) but plenty to save anything I may be doing and shut down when the audible alarm stat sounding.

Surge protection is a must but also a good ground is essential too. A good ground gives the surge arrester a place to bleed off too. Get surge protection of at least 1500 joules.

After a pretty big storm, after which, I found a dead USB hub, I did a little reading up on surge protections, and then put large metal oxide Varistors across the line on some power strips.

I don't know about the power supplies in computers sold in Thailand, but power supplies that are designed to meet ISO consumer standards already have surge protection built into them, and companies like HP and Apple make basically one design for the entire world, only localizing the power cord, if that. So most likely, your computer already has surge protection built-in.

However, that little USB hub that I lost from lightning was build in China and if that little charred thing in the USB hub power supply was surge protector, it wasn't nearly large enough.

So...you might want to have surge protection for your peripherals.

If you have your plugged into one grounded outlet and a peripheral plugged into a different grounded outlet, do not use the kind of surge protection that uses two Varistors, with one going from each line to ground, otherwise, the energy dumped from the line through the Varistor can travel through the ground and smoke your peripheral connections, possibly on both the computer and the peripheral. What a debugging nightmare that would be.

In the best of all world, have the computer and all peripherals on the same power strip, and that power strop would have two Varistors.

Sorry it this comment is long-winded, but I don't have time to write a shorter one.

once you hear a thunder storm, simply pull the plug out of the socket. If your computer is hooked up to the wall even on a surge device and a grounded line, you take the chance everything will fry.

sounds simple and stupid, but a new laptop in thailand is not cheap.

Good advice to a point, unplugging it will protect from lighting, but you have to plug in sometime and what happens when you get a power surge.
from memory I believe thailand uses a two wire system throughout domestic wiring so you would need a fly earth or earth wire if using a lead with surge protection for it to work correctly. unless you put a ELCB at the mains or another compatible device. you have to weigh up the cost.

unless phase 3 or 3 phase electric, little more stable, in rice paddy land (non 3 phase), i measured 170 - 260 volts in the outlet at different times of the day. and wonder why electronics take a beating here . didn't measure the others for consisitency, that was frustrating enough. have the higher end toys connected to the one i know works, tv/dvd/desktop, laptop as mentioned is self protected. the rest is junk, so no major problem.

agree also with thunderstorm, less than 3 kms, everything gets yanked. nothing will protect you against a hit.

I'm not the technical expert on this subject but I read that constant exposure to spikes and drops of a poor quality (ie, Thai) power grid severely and cumulatively affects a surge protector. Even if they look OK and haven't cut off, replacing them regularly is the right thing to do. Can anyone else speak to this?

I would never rely on a computer's built-in surge protector.

The Metal Oxide Varistors (MOV) used in surge protectors are very rugged devices. A poorly made MOV may fail from repeated surges that exceed its clamping voltage, but a well made one should hold up to countless small spikes and surges. MOVs are rated in Joules (watt-seconds) and are intended to only conduct surges of short duration. Otherwise, they would be larger or have provisions for heat sinking (whcih the ones used in consumer products don't have.) Excessive line voltage for a longer period (second instead of microseconds -should be very rare) can cause failure of even the best made MOVs.

Of course, as LA points out, in the case of a direct lightning hit, your surge protector may become toast along with the rest of your electronics.

Was away from home last night. With all the sparking in the sky I was very worried. Fortunately, everything still works.
But will never again be without the protection.
I have HP equipment: desktop, display, printer/copier/scanner, all bought in Thailand last week. I got a HP laptop brought from the U.S. Our house is new, wall outlets are 3-pin, but I do not know if they are properly grounded. By the way, I did not have to change the laptop adapter for Thailand, not even the plug.
Let me see if I understand some of the advice.
A 3-pin power strip will probably be sufficient to hook all the computing equipment into. As I do little on-line work, I really do not need an UPS for the time it would give me to save my work. But, an UPS will probably have a better surge protector built-in; for a relatively small cost I should to buy one for the computing equipment. Will it specify the Joules rating?
For the TV and other entertainment devices, a power strip is probably all I need.
Pull the plugs, if you anticipate lightening.
Did I get it right?

The devices I am using are 20 mm in diameter, rated at 173 Joules, 8,000 amps max, and this is about the same size as I have seen in use in power strips. The bigger the better, as long as you can afford it.