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Hello everyone,
Yesterday morning at 10:45 AM I was watching Verizon fios Cable TV in the living room on a 47" Vizio 1080p HDTV and I heard a loud pop and the TV went out including the Vizio orange Standby light logo killing the TV but not the cable box, not 5 seconds after that I heard my mother scream from her bedroom and instantly bolted upstairs. Upon reaching the top of the steps there was a bright white light coming from her bedroom and when I entered it the HDMI in cable end on the 19" Vizio HDTV was arcing white light and caught on fire..I instantly yanked the melted flaming cable end from the melted flaming HDMI port from the HDTV. Result dead TV and Cable box. About 10 seconds after that my wife said the 55" panasonic VT30 TV went blank right before my mother yelled but the power light was still on and the tv would not shut off. So after unplugging the Panasonic 3D TV the power light went out but it would not turn back on...result dead TV and cable box.

Note: I had my 2 HTPC's on hooked to the 47" and 55" TV's and they are working fine, Also my signature rig was on with monitor on standby and it is ok.

So far I called Verizon up and have a ticket going but since yesterday was a Holiday I was told I have to wait 24-48 hours for a supervisor to call me. But they could overnight the 2 new cable boxes I do not even have TV's to hook to them. Also my other 2 HDTV's that were not on are fine I am coming to the conclusion it was Verizon's fault somehow. But I realize the optical cable from the pole to house does not send voltage across that I know of and since the cable modem/router is fine along with my PC's I do not know what to think.

After Verizon I called Peco electric company who was quick to send out a tech who said everything seemed fine but we should fill out claim forms for the damaged items that has been nothing but the 3 TV's and the 2 cable boxes...I have 2 cheap surge bars on the 47" and 19" HDTVs and they were not tripped and a quite expensive one on my Panasonic VT30 55.5" 3dtv that was also not tripped.

At this point I do not know if we should call homeowners insurance yet or just call them and get the ball rolling right away?

Any advise on what I should do would be very much appreciated....I have never had a power surge in the 40+ years living in this house so any ideas on the next step would help me a great deal if this has happened to anyone here.

Thank you all very much ahead of time and I will be checking back often for responses.

I have 2 cheap surge bars on the 47" and 19" HDTVs and they were not tripped and a quite expensive one on my Panasonic VT30 55.5" 3dtv that was also not tripped.

Sorry to here about your odd issue but just to note, the power surge circuitry in power bars is not there to protect the devices but to protect the wiring in your house in case of a dead short on your appliances / powerbar.

It would be interesting to know if all those TV's are on the same power circuit to your fuse box.

Maybe lightning coverage in your insurance policy? The brand name surge protector may have some 'insurance' for connected devices up to a certain value if you look thru the small print, but good luck haggling with them over your situation.

So it was enough power to kill three TVs in separate parts of the house, presumably on separate breaker circuits, and cause an HDMI cable to arc for some length of time after the fact? That's a pretty big / lasting surge. And it only affected the TVs, no other appliances except cable boxes were affected?

Even if you're using fiber, Verizon has a powered box outside the home that converts the optical signal into an electric signal. I'd immediately check that out and see if it is damaged or somehow potentially the cause. Maybe water got into it or something? A general power surge from the grid wouldn't target just three separate TVs in a home, there's a common denominator somewhere and I'd start at that powered fiber box.Especially if the power surge didn't trip a single breaker, which implies it bypassed the breakers completely.

Even if it wasn't the source, it may have provided the conduit where the original HDTV/box shorted, sending the surge back through the central FIOS terminal and then from there into the two remaining TVs. That two of three cable boxes fried along with the TV's would imply it, so you should open and check the FIOS box on the outside of the home immediately. If her HDTV's HDMI cable was arcing for 5-10 seconds even after your HDTV went out then it could potentially have been the source, but I'm just spouting conjecture now.

Kougar wrote:

So it was enough power to kill three TVs in separate parts of the house, presumably on separate breaker circuits, and cause an HDMI cable to arc for some length of time after the fact? That's a pretty big / lasting surge. And it only affected the TVs, no other appliances except cable boxes were affected?

Even if you're using fiber, Verizon has a powered box outside the home that converts the optical signal into an electric signal. I'd immediately check that out and see if it is damaged or somehow potentially the cause. Maybe water got into it or something? A general power surge from the grid wouldn't target just three separate TVs in a home, there's a common denominator somewhere and I'd start at that powered fiber box.Especially if the power surge didn't trip a single breaker, which implies it bypassed the breakers completely.

Even if it wasn't the source, it may have provided the conduit where the original HDTV/box shorted, sending the surge back through the central FIOS terminal and then from there into the two remaining TVs. That two of three cable boxes fried along with the TV's would imply it, so you should open and check the FIOS box on the outside of the home immediately. If her HDTV's HDMI cable was arcing for 5-10 seconds even after your HDTV went out then it could potentially have been the source, but I'm just spouting conjecture now.

Ding ding! Glad you typed it up first, but I would be willing to bet something awful happened in that box. Maybe a mouse or squirrel decided it would be a great place to take a leak.

Bummer of a situation. Wild speculation as I haven't understood your wiring, but your could it be that your mother's TV went wrong and put high voltage across the the HDMI port pins, sending surge current down the HDMI lead to her cable box? And that that wasn't earthed and the surge went from there to the other blown devices?

Deanjo wrote:

I have 2 cheap surge bars on the 47" and 19" HDTVs and they were not tripped and a quite expensive one on my Panasonic VT30 55.5" 3dtv that was also not tripped.

Sorry to here about your odd issue but just to note, the power surge circuitry in power bars is not there to protect the devices but to protect the wiring in your house in case of a dead short on your appliances / powerbar.

It would be interesting to know if all those TV's are on the same power circuit to your fuse box.

Huh? Are you sure you're not thinking of a circuit breaker?

I was asking about former part of his reply, not the latter (saying that the power surge component of a power bar was to protect the wiring in the residence)

TwistedKestrel wrote:

Deanjo wrote:

I have 2 cheap surge bars on the 47" and 19" HDTVs and they were not tripped and a quite expensive one on my Panasonic VT30 55.5" 3dtv that was also not tripped.

Sorry to here about your odd issue but just to note, the power surge circuitry in power bars is not there to protect the devices but to protect the wiring in your house in case of a dead short on your appliances / powerbar.

It would be interesting to know if all those TV's are on the same power circuit to your fuse box.

Huh? Are you sure you're not thinking of a circuit breaker?

No, I am not thinking of a circuit breaker at a fuse box. Powerbars with circuit protection (same goes for fuses and breakers in appliances) are not there to prevent damage to your hooked up appliances, they are there to prevent overloading of the line and the wiring before it.

I read the headline and the first question that popped into my head was, "Does Michael Bay happen to live in your neighborhood?" Dramatic explosions seem to be his thing. Don't let Michael Bay near any of your possessions that hold significant value.

Deanjo wrote:

No, I am not thinking of a circuit breaker at a fuse box. Powerbars with circuit protection (same goes for fuses and breakers in appliances) are not there to prevent damage to your hooked up appliances, they are there to prevent overloading of the line and the wiring before it.

Okay, but all except the cheapest power bars will have both a circuit breaker (what you are referring to) and surge protection, which IS for protecting connected appliances.

Example (not "cheap", not really expensive either, just linking it for the marketing speak): http://www.apc.com/products/resource/in ... b=features

Deanjo wrote:

Sorry to here about your odd issue but just to note, the power surge circuitry in power bars is not there to protect the devices but to protect the wiring in your house in case of a dead short on your appliances / powerbar.

I think we're talking apples and oranges here. There are power bars with circuit breakers (to protect against shorts, as you note), and there are power bars with surge suppression (to protect against power surges/spikes coming in on the line). Any given power bar may have neither, one, or both features.

Now, the quality of the surge suppression in power strips varies quite a bit, and many don't do a very good job; but that's a separate discussion.

Not being at all familiar with FIOS, I'm not sure how things are connected. You say there's fiber to the house... but your cable boxes are fried? The cable boxes have a coax connection coming into them? If so, it sounds like the problem could be in whatever converts the incoming optical signal to coax... maybe that piece of equipment sent a lot of voltage into the cable boxes, which then fried the HDTVs.

It is also possible that one of the cable boxes or HDTVs suffered a major malfunction, and sent some nasty voltages back through the in-house coax wiring, frying everything connected to it.

JBI wrote:

Not being at all familiar with FIOS, I'm not sure how things are connected. You say there's fiber to the house... but your cable boxes are fried? The cable boxes have a coax connection coming into them? If so, it sounds like the problem could be in whatever converts the incoming optical signal to coax... maybe that piece of equipment sent a lot of voltage into the cable boxes, which then fried the HDTVs.

The typical installation is as Kougar described, there is a battery-backup'd powered unit somewhere outside/inside of the house near where the fiber is attached that converts the fiber connection into something more readily usable by the average consumer. This almost universally means that they they tie it into the existing coax cable that runs to the various rooms of the house. There are usually two MOCA channels, one for the internet stuff intended for your router box thingie, and one for the TV stuff intended for STB/DVR/cable cards.

If you get POTS over the fiber that's done in the same box and hooks into your existing phone wires, extremely similar concept (and that's primarily why it has a battery too).

Hence, as Kougar suggests, if that got zapped you could very easily experience something like what OP describes.

The only odd thing is that OP says that the router thingie is OK. <shrug>

Thanks for the replies a technician from Verizon is otw now. I am goin out to chk the box outside...srry for the quick reply but he otw.

NEVER file a claim with your home owner's insurance for something that does not financially destroy you. If you file a claim, your insurance rate will go up and you will pay for those TV's many times over.

Eh, depends on insurer. I've claimed twice in 20+ years, but within 1 year of each other, and the premiums were unaffected.

Well a verizon tech came out and replaced the 2 burned out boxes and with the 3 of us going out of our minds without TV's in our bedroom's I had to take the plunge and get the 3 replacement TV's using homeowners with a clause that repays and depreciation of the value of the New TV's.
The 19" vizio Razor 720p tv we replaced with a Insignia 19" throw away TV for $99 "Which has a much better picture that the Vizio had to my surprise.
And since they do not make 47" TV's any longer we replaced the 47" Vizio with 50" Sharp

My Panasonic 55.5 VT30 3D TV was replaced with a Sony 55" 3D TV 55W800 I am happy with since the VT30 had thousands of hours on it and though it still had a fantastic picture the new Sony has surprisingly good blacks and great color. Adjusting the color to my satisfaction is more difficult and I have only scraped the surface of the adjustments because of my lazyness.

I am going to call Verizon Once again since a supervisor has yet to contact me after 2 calls and on top of it all the Tech visit was never made as I received a email about it. I called and told the rep about the tech coming and She said it was just the time the supervisor was calling...but that morning of the supposed supervisor call a tech called 30 minutes before arriving at my house. I explained the situation and he acted stupid taking pictures here and there.
The one thing that has me convinced it was verizon's fault is that the 3 TV's involved were all connected to a signal amplifier they installed since the signal was not strong enough to get all the channels on the 3 affected TV's.

I called Verizon again and could not get through to a supervisor and am expecting a return call I doubt will come so I will be calling monday again Grrr!

vargis14 wrote:

3 of us going out of our minds without TV's in our bedroom's

I've never understood why people feel a need to have TVs in every room. We've got one in the family room, and one in the basement. Youngest daughter has a PC in her room that she occasionally plays DVDs or streaming video on, but that's the only bedroom-based entertainment device in the house. Which reminds me, it's probably time to upgrade at least the OS (and probably the hardware too) on her PC; IIRC (haven't looked at it in a couple of years) it's an ancient AMD Sempron running a long-ago-EOLed version of Ubuntu. She mostly uses her laptop anyway, so it's been a low priority.

just brew it! wrote:

It's probably time to upgrade.

I follow the trickle-down theory of upgrades. Build a new Skylake PC for your main system and then trickle down your old hardware where the upgrade is most needed.

JustAnEngineer wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

It's probably time to upgrade.

I follow the trickle-down theory of upgrades. Build a new Skylake PC for your main system and then trickle down your old hardware where the upgrade is most needed.

At the risk of dragging this even further off-topic...

I agree 100%. I don't even need to build a new system for myself to trickle something worthwhile down; I've got a 1090T and compatible AM3 motherboard around here somewhere. Even that would be a huge bump from the existing platform.

I've been pushing to adopt this strategy at work too. I've been helping out with some datacenter upgrades the past couple of weeks, and there's a pile of slightly older Supermicro server boards + Xeon CPUs sitting in the corner that I've removed from the servers that are being upgraded. We'd just need to get some RAM (the existing RAM already got re-purposed for use in the upgraded servers) and some cases to put them in, and they'd make great development/test assets. The one hitch I've discovered is that apparently to max the RAM out on these things you need quad-rank registered DIMMs, which seem to be a bit hard to come by...

This is just me, but I would never rehook up something that was fried until I get to the root of the problem. Especially something that expensive. JMHO.

SomeOtherGeek wrote:

This is just me, but I would never rehook up something that was fried until I get to the root of the problem. Especially something that expensive. JMHO.

The root of the problem probably got fried too, so maybe he's safe...?

just brew it! wrote:

SomeOtherGeek wrote:

This is just me, but I would never rehook up something that was fried until I get to the root of the problem. Especially something that expensive. JMHO.

The root of the problem probably got fried too, so maybe he's safe...?

LOL! Poor thing. Probably went up in a puff of smoke?

just brew it! wrote:

vargis14 wrote:

3 of us going out of our minds without TV's in our bedroom's

I've never understood why people feel a need to have TVs in every room. We've got one in the family room, and one in the basement. Youngest daughter has a PC in her room that she occasionally plays DVDs or streaming video on, but that's the only bedroom-based entertainment device in the house. Which reminds me, it's probably time to upgrade at least the OS (and probably the hardware too) on her PC; IIRC (haven't looked at it in a couple of years) it's an ancient AMD Sempron running a long-ago-EOLed version of Ubuntu. She mostly uses her laptop anyway, so it's been a low priority.

When you have three different generations living in one house, you might understand better My Grandmother watched CBN 24/7 except for local church broadcasts on Sunday. Father either watched old movies, silent films, or had FOX news running very loudly 24/7. I watched the history channel, syfi, or mythbusters at the time. I haven't used my HDTV in years, but just imagine FOX news blaring loudly from your living room 24/7 without the authority to turn it off....

Just a update Verison finally fessed up and sent me a check for 1800$ to replace the blown TV's...sure I had to use homeowners Insurance to get them replaced ASAP since all 3 of us in the house go to sleep with the TV on in the 2 bedrooms.

The replacement 55" Sony 3D tv has nothing on the panasonic VT30 it replaced It is truly a shame they stopped making plasmas, I mean mine was just going on 5 years old and the picture was still like new. It does not even auto detect a SBS 3D signal, you have to manually enable it. Also Sonys 3D glasses for the TV have problems from what I have read, the 1st is no rechargeable battery. But I picked up these XpanD glasses with rechargeable batteries and they have worked well.

The 50" Sharp I have now in living room works fine, The picture is satisfactory..but the sony is considerably better and has way better picture adjustment. The sharps picture adjustment is from the stone age with not many options and no control of RGB, but for 379$ what do you expect.

So if anyone has Fios and you have more than one TV blow out simultaneously I will help as best I can. Just be prepared for many annoying phone calls and have patience. Yelling a freaking out will not help you, in fact it will probably get you shot down.

EDIT: So I put the 2 big TV's on the curb with notes and 3d glasses on them saying they needed to be repaired along with manuals and remotes some person with a thick russian accent and son grabbed the TV's and loaded them up on their Sienna van while I was putting the leaves on my curb for pickup. Even with Big notes on them stating they needed repair do you believe they said these TV's work good yes? Me being annoyed doing the leaves for 2hrs b4 their arrival it sorta set me off. So I said Your kidding right? why would I throw out 2 great HDTVs that work with notes on them saying they need repair? The notes were huge! Shrugs

Captain Ned wrote:

It would have been nice to fix the Panny but, as I discovered on mine a couple of years ago when I had the buzz/7 blinks of death issue, there just aren't many replacement parts out there.

Power supply issue? My Panasonic rear projection LCD (yes, rather long in the tooth now...) had an issue early on where it kept eating projector bulbs. They actually sent someone out (at their expense!) to replace the power supply, and the bulb-eating behavior ceased. It's basically been trouble-free ever since.