Will this thing damage any equipment? I hear that they say not to turn anything on/off with the switch in the power strip.

http://www.amazon.com/Smart-Strip-Au...0590664&sr=1-1

 

sounds good, but it seems it may damage some compoents with the constant power on and off spikes from the switching, and also the sudden looses of power to the devices.

 

Hey Cool! I plug my monitor to the plug that controls the other plugs. I then plug my scanner, wheel, and speaker to the other plugs. Whenever my monitor is on, the scanner and speaker turn on.

I will not plug anything expensive to the on/off switch. As you said, it might damage the devices.

But... it looks to me that the Smart Strip has some protection/relay to control the on/off of the plugs. I don't have a scope with me. I think it may have some relay circuit to minimize the spike.

 

I've been using one in my MAME so that when I power on/off the computer, it also turns on/off the TV and marque lighting. Works great and I haven't heard anyone complain about premature component failures because of it. It's really no different than plugging a TV into the power outlet on a cable box and people have been doing that for many years. In fact, most TV manufactures even build in a restore-on-power feature because of that.