could power outages hurt my computer, TV, DVD players...

[goddess40]

Our neighborhood has been experiencing outages since I move here this past March. It usually just goes out and back on is a matter of seconds but we've had a few that have lasted for several minutes. They usually happen multiple times in a day and then don't happen for a week or so - three times last Wednesday and once last night.
Our older computer does have a power strip but it doesn't have the battery back up that our new one does - although I believe both go out when the power does it's disappearing act, I'll have to ask my son as it hasn't happened to me yet. The older computer has a Trojan horse virus (delprot.sys and edmond.exe) which I was trying to find a fix for but with a recent outage the circuit breaker to that computer actually flipped off and now the computer turns itself off soon after it boots up. Could these repeated outages cause this?
I've called Wisconsin Public Service and nothing gets done - I will be calling again today. A few days ago I asked a neighbor and she confirmed that her power also goes out.

[SlackJawedYokel]

1. Yes.

Could these repeated outages cause this?
Could be... try resetting your bios to its nominal configuration(should be on the first page of the bios screen).
Press F8 or Del at reboot until the bios screen comes up.

It could have done something to the hard drive.
If the power goes out when the drive is writing to disk, the head could crash and physically damage the platter.
It could have done something to the power supply.
And finally, it could have done something to the mobo.

Definitely put a small UPS on all your computers... they're pretty cheap these days and well worth it.

Double check your current UPS to see if the battery is still viable.
If it isn't sometimes you can get replacement cells from a battery store.

Don't ever plug your monitor into a UPS, it just eats up the battery life.
If power does go out while you're using it simply replug the monitor into the UPS long enough to power down safely, if it isn't set to do so automatically.
Then unplug the monitor.

Good luck

Cletus

[goddess40]

2. Thanks nt