Zinc Whiskers Cripple Colorado's Computers

Mr. Christmas Lights writes "While zinc whiskers, small metallic fibers which grow on surfaces that have been electroplated with zinc, aren't a problem for Christmas lights, they can cause serious problems for computers. The Denver Post reports how they caused computer outages for the last three weeks in the Colorado secretary of state's office. This basically halted business and elections document filings. Zinc whiskers are becoming more of a problem as computers electronics get smaller. NASA has a good reference site which includes a interesting PDF summary paper complete with pictures. /.'ers with computer rooms might want to check this out."

Comments

protecting electronics?

[TexasDex]

Tiny little bits of a conductive material are rarely good news for electronics.

I am wondering if they will have some sort of sheilding system for this in the future, if it becomes more of a problem. That could be as simple as a small layer of some nonconductive resin on the surface of the circuits. But will it ever be economically feasible?

I suppose in the mean time we'll have to do our own safeguarding if we are in a risky area.

Re:protecting electronics?

[Tony-A]

I suppose in the mean time we'll have to do our own safeguarding if we are in a risky area.

Hmmmm, seems like if you wanted to grow something like zink whiskers, you'd want a nice stable environment, free of foreign contaminants, and time, lots of time. From this standpoint, a dusty garage is a safer environment than a carefully controlled data center. Problems with monocultures.

What about conformal coating?

[winkydink]

I thought almost all quality electronic devices have a conformal coating (non-conducting polymer) applied to PCBs? Colorado must be buying el-cheapo crap. Remember, you get what you pay for.

Re:Absolutely no way

[NigritudeUltramarine]

It's not bullshit. Get over it. Interestingly, there are very few people who know of this issue, but knowledge is spreading.

There are tens of thousands of data centers in operation in the United States, and likely an order of magnitude above that worldwide.

In each, often hundreds (or even thousands) of computers are consolidated in one room.

You simply cannot convince me that this is a real problem that we need to worry about. Yes, OBVIOUSLY you don't start pouring out bags of metal filings into your ventilation system. We already KNEW that. But not buying anything made from zinc? No way. We'd have data centers shutting down all over the place, if as Rich Hill says, "Metal on floor panels and even in computer cases can secrete zinc crystals over time."

The state said, "The outages ... highlight why the state's various websites should be brought under one authority." Huh? What? The answer is that they needed some excuse, they found Data Clean, and they got it. I would bet top dollar that if an indepdendent team were brought in, an entirely unrelated cause would be found.

Re:Absolutely no way

[Anonymous Coward]

Read the various papers. They are not talking about one whisker tripping a power supply, or even a dozen. Its hundreds, gradually building up enough of a path for a short (or drain on the power supply) to cause problems.

Re:Absolutely no way

[Anonymous Coward]

"I would bet top dollar that if an indepdendent team were brought in, an entirely unrelated cause would be found."

yup. think about it--if this really were gradual like they claimed, wouldn't all the computers fail at different times? think of airflow--the metal wouldn't be distributed to any two computers at the the same rate. why would all of the computers all of a sudden fail now? even the nasa articles back that up. the denver post story is total bs.

Just wait for tin wiskers

[Anonymous Coward]

With all the RoHS crap going on (the "lead free" european requirements), you'll be seeing a lot more failures do to tin wiskers. It's already looking like it will affect the life of most future electronic products.