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Comment by Naga | Hacker News Reader

I forgot about these until this post. I used to have one when they came out, and I worked at a retail store where all of our kiosks had these.

Does anyone else get electric shocks often from them? I would get them anytime I touched the metal case of it. I never thought to google it or anything.

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>Does anyone else get electric shocks often from them?

Oh yes. Also, many aluminum laptops when plugged in.

I received some fun electric stimulation when my hand was touching both my aluminium Apple keyboard and my MacBook Pro when it was plugged in.

If you use the long cable to plug the charger into the wall you’ll avoid this, it has the additional ground conductor which connects to the large round metal post on the charger.

Winter is a painful time for static electricity...anything that conducts electricity can shock you.

Aluminum computers or keyboards, steel wall corners...if it has exposed metal, I swear I have been shocked!

This is a characteristic of your mains AC supply. You won't get a shock off things not connected to the mains AC earth (usually plugged in appliances and radiators/water pipes).

The MacBook power adapters here (NZ) don’t have an earth pin, but my MacBooks give me vicious shocks. I always wondered if finding an earthed adapter (must be available in other countries!?) would fix this.

In most countries untried it is illegal... But if you crack open the power supply and remove the "Y" capacitor (usually the only bright blue component in there), these shocks won't happen anymore.

The downside is your MacBook might start giving out radio frequency interference...

The two pin plug that attaches directly to the power brick isn’t grounded, but the power adapter extension lead is and it solves this problem. https://www.apple.com/nz/shop/product/MK122X/A/power-adapter...

Usually when electronic devices have a metal housing, they're tied to ground. Getting shocked could be a sign of a wiring issue in the building. Ground should be at zero electrical potential.

The tingling you may feel is absolutely normal. Most devices (Mac minis and MacBooks while connected to the charger) don‘t even connect to PE (only 2 connectors on the plug).

The tingling comes from some leakage across the transformer isolated primary/secondary but is so small that it’s not dangerous.

That’s also completely unrelated to static discharges that zap you once you touch something that can equalize the potential

The post on the AC adapter (that the duckhead or extension cable slots into) is earthed, and some adapters (other than the 2 prong US duckhead) continue this to the building ground.

The US extension cable is earthed, and I believe some duckheads in other countries are as well. The power adapters that were in use for mac desktops during the time period that the person I am replying to was referring to were earthed. https://th.bing.com/th/id/OIP.vmVNrqGAR3raMcey5fAXUQHaE6

Although you are correct in cases where the device is not earthed.

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