Can a van der graaf generator kill a promethean board?

[Meldrew]

Hi,

 

In one of our science rooms, we've just been called down to find a promethean board dead. It worked before the class was using a van der graaf generator apparently. Its a new ish board (eg 6 months) that only connects to a laptop USB. No light on the board, no USB insertion noise, etc. The generator was also apparently affecting the projector, making it go 'flickery'.

 

Any thoughts?

 

Meldrew

[Andrew_C]

Yes, maybe... but I doubt it would kill the power supply. So I'd sort of expect some signs of life.

[johnat1121]

Seems possible as the static electricity could have jumped some contacts and blown an internal fuse in the PSU hence no power, when I was in secondary skl the teacher busted a Netgear Metal Access point that was on the roof with a VanDerGraaf the NM was not so happy and had a bit of a

[plexer]

Static electricity = bad for electronic devices so yes entirely possible.

 

Ben

[GREED]

Sounds like a challenge worthy of finding out!

[Andrew_C]

Not the static, but the radiated broadband EM pulse.

[Bananas]

Yup no one should run one anywhere near delicate electronics like whiteboards or laptops

[mats]

Can a van der graaf generator kill a promethean board? Definately. It's very low current, but you are likely to have a few KV knocking around. Smartboards aren't build for that kind of abuse!