Protecting Laptops?

Like a lot of us, I use a laptop on board for a whole lot of things. It's my second nav system (running Coastal Explorer, which I love) as well as email, document storage and management, watching Netflix etc. etc. In other words it's an important piece of kit.

So how do folks protect their laptops (and tablets, etc.) from the long term ravages of salt air? I am debating putting the laptop into a bag of rice at night, which is cheaper than buying desiccant.

Thoughts and comments?

David

David Rive said:

Like a lot of us, I use a laptop on board for a whole lot of things. It's my second nav system (running Coastal Explorer, which I love) as well as email, document storage and management, watching Netflix etc. etc. In other words it's an important piece of kit.
Thoughts and comments?

David

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David, if you have a pilot house trawler, I wouldn't worry about it. Chances are you will replace/upgrade the laptop or pad long before you have to worry about corrosion problems.

We also have a laptop onbard, but like others we tend to replace them every couple of years, so I’ve never had a laptop actually fasil for any reason.

We don’t treat our music system, tv, microwave plus some other consumer electronics any differently than the ones when we had in a house. We have 2 laptops on board and don’t do anything special with them either, we’ll once we did. During a major lightning storm, I put one in the oven to shield it. That night I forgot it was there and turned on the broiler.

Buy one of these and you won't have to worry about protecting it

http://business.panasonic.com/toughbook/fully-rugged-laptop-toughbook-31.html

L

Bay Pelican has a 10 year old laptop (net book actually) which has never been off the boat. Flashlights and batteries have been affected, but not the handheld GPSs nor electronic testing equipment.

I have used a computer safe for safety of at least one laptop during lightning storms.

Mine shut down from overheat due to sun coming in pilot house windows in the Bahamas.

Came back to life after shutting down and cooling off. Whew. Other than that, I don't worry a bit about it.

Best bet is to get a portable hard drive and a scheduled backup. Also, use as many cloud based applications as practical, especially if you cruise in areas with ready internet access. Having solid state storage helps too.

I have had my Asus G75 gaming laptop with me on board since I moved aboard over 4 years ago and have done nothing special to it, and most of those years was on a tiny sailboat that had no central HVAC to keep things dry

Salt compounds won't naturally evaporate and disperse into the air. "Salt air" is actually a very fine mist of seawater typically created as a boat is moving or by wind storms that kick up the seas.

**those more knowledgeable then I, feel free to fact check me **

Larry M said:

We don’t treat our music system, tv, microwave plus some other consumer electronics any differently than the ones when we had in a house. We have 2 laptops on board and don’t do anything special with them either, we’ll once we did. During a major lightning storm, I put one in the oven to shield it. That night I forgot it was there and turned on the broiler.

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Larry, I'd laugh but I suspect you were not pleased. I hope it was your computer and not the wife's. You being a loving husband, bought a new computer, gave it to your wife and transferred all her programs and data to the new computer, you utilizing her 'old' computer. What a nice husband.

Thread creep. When discussing computers on boat I suggest buying a computer to use exclusively for your navigation program. This reduces the crashes and trouble when underway, the cheapest laptop/netbook etc or the new nettops seem to work perfectly with my Nobeltec program and Coastal Explorer. These units are never connected to the internet except when I am updating the maps which is no more frequently than yearly.

I have taken all programs off these computers except those relating to navigation and one program for getting on the internet.

Lou_tribal said:

Buy one of these and you won't have to worry about protecting it

Panasonic Toughbook 31 Rugged Computer - Panasonic Toughbook 31 Laptop

L

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Sure but does it float? LOL

OldDan1943 said:

Larry, I'd laugh but I suspect you were not pleased. I hope it was your computer and not the wife's. ...

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We were not happy campers at the time and it was mine, really. We smelled the plastic and rather quickly pulled it out of the oven. The lid was all blisters/bubbles. Surprisingly, it worked after we let it cool down. I guess we didn't have to worry about any moisture.

Have had 2 Dells onboard for over 5 years living aboard.

One crashed a hard drive, replaced tbe hard drive with solid state drive and is my primary nav.

Last year spilled a glass of wine into it, poured it out, dried it in the sun and air, still working fine. Cheap Merlot so maybe not that corrrosive.

No problems with environment, harder to keep malware off of them tban salt air.

As others day, more likely to replace for an upgrade thsn corrosion issues.

Well the consensus seems clear - I will stop fretting. My Dell has a solid state drive, after 32 years in the software business I will never again own a old style spinning drive. Thanks for the comments everyone.

Larry - Maria is still laughing at your microwave story. Cheers.

David