water on a pcb

When working on installing components and a little bit of sweat drips from your hair onto an electromagnetic computer component component, will the component that sweat drips on be automatically damaged or is there a certain amount of time you should wait?

I turned the computer on about 3 minutes after I finished getting everything back together and turned the computer on. I could tell that my 9800GTX+ was damaged, because there was some minor desktop graphics corruption and then when I tried a game, it was unplayable because the frame rate was so choppy, as it had not been before I installed a new MB and accidentally sweated on the video card I had a few minutes before.

I couldn't dry the sweat, because I could tell the sweat when right where a memory chip was located (exactly the place you would not want it go.)

I'd assume if sweating on it didn't damage it right away, then I should've waited a little longer to turn my machine on. If this happens in the future, how long should I give the sweat to dry?
 
Not just Inadequate - Unacceptable!

Back on topic, perhaps you should turn on the AC or wear a sweatband when you work on your comp. :smile:
 
I've been told that if you spill liquid on electronics you should do something a bit unintuitive. Rinse it with more water only this time use deionized water as the impurities in the spilled liquid could cause problems.

Of course this assumes you unplugged the device as soon as liquid was spilled on it. Next you need to make sure everything is completely dry before reapplying power to the device. A few minutes is not sufficient.

Ideally you'd have an oven like an electronics company, but if you don't have access to special equipment maybe a hair dryer would speed things up.

If I really wanted to recover a device I'd look around for articles online that are more authoritative than a random forum poster.
 
I've generally had no problems just letting something air-dry. Then again this is with less complex PCBs like Keyboards and Mice. Which will act funky with electrical signals shorting through the liquid until it's dry.

With high voltage devices I'm sure the potential for damage would be quite a bit higher. That said, at least have a Fan blowing air across you if you don't have anything else. Even in a humid envirionment (like say Taiwan) it does wonders to almost immediately dry out your skin to where perspiration is a non factor as long as you remain in the flow of air.

Regards,
SB
 
To answer the original question now that the unpleasantness has been dealt with, I usually give it about 3-4 hours drying time more than I think it needs if something like that happens before powering up again.
 
Umm yeah... you use a hairblower set to low speed/ehat to dry the wet area while ensuring the wet area is upwards to make it easier for the water to vaporate away.

Then you let it be for some hours.
 
Umm yeah... you use a hairblower set to low speed/ehat to dry the wet area while ensuring the wet area is upwards to make it easier for the water to vaporate away.

Then you let it be for some hours.

A 5800 Ultra would be highly effective. :yes:
 
Thats right Alstrong. 5800 ultra + drivers that didn't correctly detect 3D application launch. BTW Nvidia Riva 128 comes to mind... mmm toasty! :D
 
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