Over To You: How Do I Stop Power Surges Wrecking My DJ Sets?

Digital DJ Tips reader Chad writes: “I’m a mobile DJ last 15 years or so and I’ve fully embraced technology. I use Traktor Pro with a Kontrol S4 for home mixing or when I’ve been asked to do a long dance set at a party, but my main working tools at weddings are laptop going through a GIGIport AG sound card with Asio drivers into an analogue mixer. Very solid. My problem is three times in the last year a power ‘burp’ (for want of a better word) in venue has caused my laptop to lose connection to the sound card. I thought maybe it was the drivers that were the problem but it happened last night at a gig and I saw someone putting in a plug at the exact same time I lost connection.

“Then I got to thinking it could happen with any sound card or controller if it’s power related. I wondered if other people have this issue, and what power surge protection devices DJs use to prevent this from happening?”

Digital DJ Tips says:

It’s a good question. It’s interesting though, because of course your laptop of course has a battery so some might say it shouldn’t really be affected when such stuff happens. I suspect this is why you won’t find many DJs replying here saying they use surge protectors, but I may be wrong.

Here in Spain where my home is, the power grid is renowned for tiny blips in supply (the main electricity company is being sued for some of the side effects this has cause to customers, but yet they still seem to happen regularly), but even so personally I’ve never had any issues with DJing either in the worksop or at gigs that are even remotely similar to what you’re experiencing.

I thought this might be a good one to throw open to our ever-knowledgeable readers, to see if they have any experience of similar issues and have got any solutions.

So – over to you! Have you experienced a similar issue to Chad’s? Do you use any kind of power surge protection on your gear? What would you advise Chad should check or do to try and prevent this from happening in the future? And wisdom would be very much appreciated – please post in the comments.