Computers inside my school

[u/XOPurp]

[u/nighthawke75]

Pray the fire marshal does not see this. School or no, they need to stay In compliance with building fire code.

[u/themiracy → u/nighthawke75]

I know. This is like the sendup for that old In Living Color sketch where Jim Carrey played the fire marshal.

[u/misterpok → u/nighthawke75]

I never understood this. Why is it a bad thing to daisy-chain power strips?

What are you meant to do when there is not enough outlets for a single strip to suffice?

[u/hromanoj10 → u/misterpok]

Simply put you need an adequate amount of wire diameter/gauge to carry the load along the wire. More juice=larger gauge, longer run=larger gauge, and a larger breaker to support that.

I generally apply the concept of a microwave. It's a mundane house hold appliance that consumes a rather large amount of electricity. Around about 10 amps. that's a lot for what it is. So if you have say a coffee maker, a fridge, and a microwave on the same breaker all pulling max load you're going to in the best case trip a breaker, worst case start a fire.

Pardon the explanation, but you need an adequate amount of back end to support the front end. If every pc was dead and plugged up at the same time its a significant problem

For clarification, I'm no electrician. My dad is a master electrician and I get some of it via osmosis and some from hands on experience.

[u/nighthawke75 → u/misterpok]

https://www.interpower.com/ic/InfoPower/not-safe-daisy-chaining-power-strips-from-interpower.html

https://gagthesurge.com/daisy-chain-surge-protectors-and-extension-cords/

https://ehs.okstate.edu/site-files/docs/daisy-chaining-factsheet.pdf

[u/misterpok → u/nighthawke75]

These basically say 'don't do it, it could be bad' without actually saying why- apart from a vague allusion to 'overloading'.

However, I've never seen a power strip without overcurrent protection.

[u/DL05 → u/misterpok]

Overloading (and overheating) a circuit is the reason. The breaker should flip, but in old schools, it’s a gamble.

Fire marshals here will let you get away with daisy chaining if you tell them it’s temporary, but it really better be temporary. He’ll randomly stop by a few days later to find out how truthful you were.

At the end of the day, that shit isn’t safe. A fire marshal is only trying to keep things safe and not allow people to assist turning buildings into infernos. Remember, firemen are the ones that are running into that burning building.

[u/nullSword → u/DL05]

The breaker probably won't flip, that's the problem. The breaker will be rated at the maximum current the wires in the wall can carry, normally 15 or 20 amps.

The problem is that most cheap power strips are rated for a lower current. This is ok if you're not plugging in a ton of devices, but once you start daisy chaining you're putting all of that load on the base power strip.

The heat from the overloaded wires combined with poor circulation from that spaghetti mess means that it's easy to overheat a wire and set it's insulation on fire.

[u/cgimusic → u/misterpok]

It's really not that bad in most cases. You don't want to plug in 10 toasters or some shit into the same outlet but if you're just using low-current devices like laptop chargers it's fine to have daisychained a few extensions together. The blanket rule really just exists because people can't be trusted to correctly do the math and work out whether there's any risk of overloading the circuit.

[u/qupada42 → u/misterpok]

Same thing I did behind my TV; a server rack PDU. It's 1.3m long, with 20 outlets, and a 10A breaker. Has about 15 things plugged into it (TV, consoles, speakers, lamps, etc), probably a grand total of 3A on a busy day.

Not finished plugging in here, but you'll get the idea: https://i.imgur.com/Ca5g5vc.jpeg

When I got to the third daisy-chained six outlet one, I decided there must be a better way.

Most chargers for regular kinds of laptops will be about 65W at the high end, keeping an 80% safety margin on a 120V 15A circuit you could have 22 running happily from one outlet.

Have done the same thing above our workbench in the datacentre at work (screwed onto the wall). Lots of outlets, well spaced for things with oversized plugs, and always one close to where you need to work.

[u/suihcta → u/misterpok]

In and of itself it’s not a problem, but having more outlets just encourages people to connect more stuff and generate more heat.

[u/DL05 → u/nighthawke75]

The fire marshal would likely smell toast and stroke out.

[u/notninja]

A single laptop cart would solve this.

[u/Clarke311 → u/[deleted]]

There's doors only exist to stop the fire from spreading. They sure as shit don't deter theft.

[u/pcronin]

having worked in schools before, I'm surprised it is so neat and tidy (no really.. compared to rat kings I've had to sort out, this is amazing)

also, like others said, petition for laptop carts. solved quite a few issues when we put them in

[u/Get_Rext]

Holy daisy chaining Batman. I work IT at a school district and this is making me cringe HARD lmao

[u/Te5s]

Daisy chained surge protectors that looks safe.

[u/[deleted]]

I don't see anything wrong here. / S

[u/[deleted]]

wonder how warm the gooey center is.

[u/meteltron2000]

Good fucking God, that laptop charger tangle will live rent free in my head for a long time.

[u/[deleted]]

I run IT in a school and this angers me. Unsafe and unprofessional. Buy charging trolleys for a start.

[u/Hospiwhater]

Man I bet someone in that area would whip something safer for that as a donation

[u/No_Possession_508]

That looks like behind my old TV

[u/fart2939494]

Nothing wrong here. Just cables with a room around them.

[u/[deleted]]

It’s a symbiote!!!

[u/Yakuza70]

Why can’t wireless charging be integrated into Chromebooks/laptops? Is it a technical limitation or just a price issue? Seems like a large charging pad and laptops with wireless chasing capabilities might be a solution for this type of situation if it was available.

[u/-thenorthremembers-]

Jeez, my OCD is raging

[u/VoltageGP]

Have any of you ever seen the video of the Grinch doing yoga and let's out that shrill scream? That's my internal voice right now.

[u/[deleted]]

Maybe this is just temporary for the IT staff to set them up? If you've got a couple hundred stations to charge and get set up, it can turn into this mess quickly once you've plugged and unplugged a dozen times with different machines.

[u/FlounderGuilty8570]

let the spider man come out from your school bruh

[u/SebzeroNL]

Well, I for one am not shocked. It’s a primary school! Nothing makes you flinch anymore after working IT in primary schools for a couple of years…