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KremlinHoosegaffer t1_ixyzqr9 wrote

Reply to comment by RhynoD in ELI5 why do you need to turn of hard drives to unplug them instead of just unplugging them by Devil_kin1

I'm talking about hard drives not thumb drives. Those that require sata cables and clip into your motherboard.

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RhynoD t1_ixz0b8g wrote

All of the components in your PC are tested against static electricity.

If your drive is plugged in, it's grounded and any stray charge will pass harmlessly through the case and never touch any of the electronics inside.

If it is not plugged in, there is no path to ground and the charge will not pass through the drive at all.

If you pulled off the case, you are already doing something dumb and likely to damage your drive regardless of any static charge. Even so, the amount of charge you'll get from a mild static discharge is unlikely to damage any components. At most you might corrupt a couple of bits of data, but honestly even that is unlikely.

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