Ethernet Fried

C

Crimsonnaire

Member
Hey, everyone.

I recently suffered a rather severe power surge from a thunderstorm where the ethernet feature on both my Westell 6100 modem and tower motherboard was fried. A loud electrical pop was heard just before I got the "LAN disconnected" notification on the monitor when it was still physically connected. I was hoping to someone could answer the following questions which will help me to better understand the situation as well as how to go about handling the challenge.

First, I should mention that my tower, monitor, and modem power cords were all plugged into a surge protector during the time of the surge. Coupled with the fact that only the ethernet components on both the modem and motherboard (all other tower functions still work) were fried, is it reasonable to assume that the shock came from the DSL wall outlet? Or could the surge have originated from the power outlet/surge protector and fried the ethernet components on the motherboard and modem while leaving all the rest (processor, HDD, monitor, sound/graphics/RAM cards, etc.) undamaged?

Next, I've considered using the USB to connect to the modem since the ethernet is knocked out. In the event of another power surge, would there be a higher susceptibility to damage with the remaining components of the tower if the surge enters through the USB this time?

My surge protector as a phone cord jack. Being that the DSL cord is essentially a phone cord, would plugging the DSL cord into the surge protector and then plugging phone line from the surge protector to my tower be an effective method in surge protecting the modem along with the rest of the computer equipment? Or would the typical intereference to the internet connection make it not worthwhile?

Also, replacing the ethernet card/jack is my current plan. However, is there a possibility that the surge could've shorted out something else in addition or exclusive to the ethernet card/jack where the ethernet connection could still be nonfunctional even after replacing the card/jack? Or is the ethernet card designed specifially so that any voltage higher than the normal operating peak disables the card such as a fuse?

Finally, can someone please identify the ethernet card in this picture of the motherboard and clarify on whether there's any special tool or procedure in removing it?

Img543a-1.jpg


I'm uncertain whether the ethernet card and jack is coupled together as a single component, but the blue arrow points to the silver box which is where the LAN cord plugs into.

Any help is greatly appreciated.
 
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Has the BIOS got a LAN connection tester?

I had something strange like this happen to me also some years ago. My Ethernet just cut out and I had to use a seperate card for about a year when suddenly, the onboard one came back working. I don't know why..

Have you another computer (laptop?) which you could test the same connection with?
 
Well, given that he heard an audible pop, I doubt it's just going to come back. As for the Ethernet card, most computers these days, including yours, have Ethernet built into the motherboard. You can't remove or replace it, but you can get a new ethernet card that will plug into the motherboard. Here's a cheap but reliable one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833156107

And yeah, the surge almost definitely came through the telephone line, and if you would have had the phone line going through the surge protector it would likely have prevented this.
 
low resistance on those phone lines...electricity goes for line of least resistance...and that was the dsl line...*pop*
 
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