invading varmints was Re: powering up older machines - is it safe?

I arguably my first vintage computer invaded by apparently teeny tiny critters once! I had the box, a TI PC, stuck in my parked van for a winter anyhow. I fired it up one day, and nothing happened, and the fan would only budge intermittently. I opened it up and *something* doo doo doo doo, tore up all sort of paper and insulation to make a really suave pad! Thing is the opening were pretty small. I have trouble thinking it was done by insects, but I cannot imagine a rodent fitting through any of those openings. It was skeery!

--- schwepes at moog.netaxs.com wrote: > I've had the issue twice. The first time was a Heathkit stereo where > a bad capacitor killed the transformer and the second one was an Acer > 286 that had a mouse problem, biological kind. bs > > On Wed, 4 Jun 2008, Tony Duell wrote: > > > I can understand worrying about something that's not been used for > > > a few years, but if you check everything that's not been used for > > > just a few months, when do you have time to actually _do_ anything? > > > Well, if I am using a machine every day, I don't check it every time > > (there's no point, the PSU could fail in the time between checking it > > and reconnectin it to the logic :-)). But if I get a machine out that > > I've not used recently, then, yes, I do check it. It doesn't take me > > long. I've probably done it before, so I know what to unplug, where to > > connect the dummy load (if needed) and the meter, and so on. In come > > cases, I've built up test units, in which case it takes even less time. > > > > And 10 minutes, or so, spent checking the PSU is easily a lot less than > > the time it would take me to sort out the damage caused by a > > malfunctioning PSU. > > > > -tony