On the eastern side of the United States, today is best described as an ice cube – even for Tampa Florida where PCMech is based:
Even though it happens rarely, cold snaps causing freezing temperatures do happen in Florida.
In a truly cold area for this time of year, like Boston, Massachusetts, that’s where you see the Fahrenheit numbers really take a dive:
It’s not your PC you have to worry about, it’s your phone
PCs operate best when cold. And as for the question "How cold is too cold?", the answer is that if there’s frost, meaning condensation, appearing on your PC’s inner components.. yeah, that’s too cold. Any cooler temperature above that however is safe territory, so if from a cooling system the inside of your PC feels like an ice bucket and there’s no frost, your PC will happily hum along without complaint. When you see condensation however, that’s very bad because water and electronics don’t mix. The statement of "When my file server has a frosty dew on the board, I’m doing something right" is obviously not literal advice; that’s meant as a joke. Keep your PCs condensation-free at all times.
As I mentioned back in November, there are some mobile phones that won’t operate properly at below-freezing temperatures. The phones particularly susceptible to this are the touchscreen variant, as many will list their absolute minimum operating temperature at 32F/0C.
General advice that will keep your phone working in the cold
1. Don’t leave the phone in the car if you park outside
With the car off and the phone sitting in the glove box, on a day like today the phone will fall below its minimum operating temperature. Take the phone with you when you leave the car.
2. Plugging in an ice-cold car charger plug into a phone’s power port is a bad idea
In extreme situations this can actually cause condensation (ruining the port) and/or warping of the port and/or the charger’s pins. Fortunately there’s an easy solution. This will sound kooky but it works. Unplug the charger and place in your coat pocket for a few minutes. Your body heat through the coat will bring up the temperature of the charger enough to where it won’t cause any damage.
"Couldn’t I do the same by holding the charger plug in front of a heater fan in my car?"
Yes, but that will most likely heat it up too quickly. Tiny little charger pins react badly to sudden temperature changes and may fail because of that. The goal here is to warm up the charger slowly, and the safest way to do that is just to place in a coat pocket for a few minutes. You’ll know it’s ready to plug into the phone when the tip of the charger plug doesn’t feel cold anymore to the touch.
3. When in doubt, use a earbud/earpiece
Unless your coat is lined with lead, your phone will have the same reception in the pocket as it will in the open cold and remain at operating temperatures. Also remember it’s a lot cheaper to replace and earpiece than it is to replace a phone.
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I’m waiting for the next Winter Slasher movie. The clueless blonde stumbling thru the icy forest, crying and boo-hooing, then she remembers that her boyfriend (Who is now dead, of course– besides she wasn’t all tat ‘Into’ him anyways) had a cellphone! She runs back to the body to dig the phone out of the gruesome remains…cries some more, shows some bosom, gasps prettily at the darkness and then tries to use the phone. .
Then she MOANS in HORROR as her finger stabs at the screen to no effect.
(Cue the menacing power saw in the background)
She RUNS!. But remembers the PCMech article that her (now Dead) boyfriend told her about earlier– so she squeezes the COLD phone deep down her bosom (Scientifically Proven Strong appeal to the Young Teen Male Demographic)
She RUNS.
The Rampaging Murderer pursues!
The Phone Gets Warmer!
She finds herself back at the dark cabin where they first started (Don’t they Always?) She dashes back inside and hides. Shakily, she removes the now warm Smartphone from her bosom.(Teen Male Demographic experience targeted NC-17 rated lascivious thoughts)
She presses the ON button.
Android then informs her that it has finished DOWNLOADING THE LATEST SYSTEM UPDATE AND WILL NOW REBOOT.
Our Heroine SCREAMS IN TERROR!
(Cue the sound of Power Saw cutting through flimsy wooden door…)
You were doing good up until the end.
What should have happened is that the phone finally turned on, the battery explodes because of flimsy Chinese build standards, her hand is completely blown off from the explosion, THEN the killer busts through the door and chops her into little bits.
…only to show it wasn’t a killer at all but a Verizon rep looking to collect late fees.
Now, now. . .Movies are made by committee nowadays. And LAWYERS are always on ANY Committee. And Verizon has LOTS of Lawyers.