AC power surge - deadly?
 

Just got a new AC and I notice all that power surging makes my music 'skip'. Can this damage my computer in any way? and is there something I can do about it?

Surge protectors are cheap.

Depends on your hardware but if you got some junk in there a nice little surge can screw up your shit. Just like buying crappy ass AMD boards which dont turn off when they overheat so that you end up burning both the CPU and board.

Shuttle can suck my ass :1orglaugh

I have a good less than a year old Dell system and I have a surge protector so I should be ok then?

Yeah, and if shit goes bad anyway then you can always claim damages against the surge protector. But theoretically speaking if you are using a surge protector and you are getting jumps in your current which are visible on your computer, either on your monitor or somewhere else, then the surge protector isnt really doing its job.

Thanks, I'll prolly have to pray to Thor for protection then. How appropriate.

as cheap as UPS's are getting, why the hell don't you have one?

if your AC is using a lot of amps, your probably getting sags; or undervoltage.
A surge protector will do no good.
Doubtful you'll get any hardware damage out of it. Just a pain in the ass.

Surges and spikes are different. A surge is like a spike only slow and not as severe. You might get a surge to your box when your AC shuts down or anything with an electric motor on the wiring system shuts off. small surges will destroy your box over time.

Spikes are quick, intense and will fuck you and all your shit up in an instant... i.e. lightning.

A surge portector will work for surges but not many spikes.

Best bet would be a UPS to keep the power conditioned like iroc409 said.
Good luck!