How concerned should one be about static electricity when touching electronics?

Deleted User · May 1, 2020

In my laptop's user manual it says you should always use an anti-static mat and anti-static wrist band. It warns that our bodies can be charged and will discharge when touching metals, even if you don't feel anything. This process will send a very high voltage very low amperage jolt of electricity which can destroy or reduce the lifespan of electronic components. Exactly how careful should I be when touching an electronic component like the contacts on a micro SD card, the charge port on a Switch or a Raspberry Pi without a case or when replacing my laptop's hard drive?

What should I use as a grounded surface to attach an anti-static mat and wrist strap to?

Tom Bombadildo · May 1, 2020

Do you have to wear one? No. So long as you ground yourself on something metal whenever you're working on electronics, you're not going to suddenly ruin your devices, and so long as you're not doing something dumb like doing the work on a carpet and walking around and rubbing all up on the floor, chances are you'll probably not cause any damage to whatever even if you don't ground yourself.

Something that should be noted as well is that modern devices are usually designed with high resistance to ESD, so as long as you're not getting real handsy and touching every capacitor or exposed contact, you probably won't harm anything.

If you're worried, simply don't do electronics work anywhere around carpet, keep your work area around 40% humidity (dry air can cause static), don't directly touch any contacts or components on a PCB, and ground yourself on something metal that's also grounded before touching anything (like, say, on metal from a PC case that's plugged in) and you'll never have any issues.

I've been doing PC work for nearly 10+ years now, and I've never worn an anti-static bracelet, and I've never killed any component with ESD by simply touching metal stuff before working on anything.

Foxi4 · May 1, 2020

ESD has the potential to knock out electronics, but the devices you use every day are grounded. In fact, they're ESD tested and *purposefully* attacked with a static electricity gun to ensure that they're safe and well-shielded. Those machines create stronger ESD than your sweater could possibly generate, and our modern electronics are fine with it.

That's not to say that you should randomly short traces or pins, but in everyday use in line with the manufacturer's recommendations ESD damage is usually a freak accident. Modern components are fully capable of withstanding voltage orders of magnitude higher than what they're rated for, provided it's applied in short intervals only. Things you plug into your outlet are tested with a flash tester, to the tune of kilovolts. This is because a manufacturer must ensure that the PCB won't "flash over" from the high voltage side (240V/120V AC) to the low voltage side (5/12/19V/24V DC etc.), thus making the appliance conduct mains voltage and potentially damaging it or harming the user.

In most applications you're fine. I would only apply extra care when handling media storage like HDD's, SSD's, SD's and cartridges, and bare PCB's, but not to the extent of wearing a grounding wristband or anything of the sort. Simply don't touch exposed components, no matter what it is, and if you must do so for the purposes of maintenance, discharge yourself by touching a grounded surface first, like a household radiator.

Deleted User · May 3, 2020

Tom Bombadildo said:
so long as you're not doing something dumb like doing the work on a carpet and walking around and rubbing all up on the floor

What exactly do you mean by this? I've walked across carpet and touched my Raspberry Pi, SD cards and headphone jacks before. If that's enough to damage them then I might have shortened their lifespans. If you mean something closer to dancing on the carpet then they are fine.

Tom Bombadildo · May 3, 2020

koohiiwonomimasu69 said:
What exactly do you mean by this? I've walked across carpet and touched my Raspberry Pi, SD cards and headphone jacks before. If that's enough to damage them then I might have shortened their lifespans. If you mean something closer to dancing on the carpet then they are fine.

I mean purposefully generating static before working on something. As in rubbing your feet on carpet for a good 5 minutes and then touching every exposed lead or contact to shock it.

As Foxi above mentioned, most things are designed to withstand a lot of static discharge, so it's not really an issue you're going to face at any point accidentally, it'll likely only ever be a problem if you're shocking things on purpose.

FamicomHeero · Jun 4, 2020

I've always taken precautions before touching electronics but I've only worn a wrist strap once I think. Either I've been lucky or it's more rare than people think.

DarkFlare69 · Jun 4, 2020

It's more of a precaution than a necessity. I've built multiple computers, opened up game consoles, swapped RAM in laptops. and done plenty of things with electronics with no protection. It's never caused any problems. You have to be intentionally trying to cause a problem, or just really unlucky.

How concerned should one be about static electricity when touching electronics?

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