From: g_d_pusch_remove_underscores@xnet.com   
   Copy: nfitz@sentex.ca   
      
   nfitz@sentex.ca (Nicholas Fitzpatrick) writes:   
      
   > In article ,   
   > Henry Spencer  wrote:   
   >> In article ,   
   >> Mad Scientist  wrote:   
   >>> Can the electromagnetic radiation from this solar flare erase hard   
   >>> disks or other magnetic media?   
   >>   
   >> No.  Except insofar as it might indirectly cause difficulties for software   
   >> or other hardware, which might respond poorly and mistakenly decide that   
   >> altering the contents of the disk was the right thing to do.   
   >   
   > Hmm ... not even the x-ray radiation?  I wouldn't have thought it would   
   > have been very healthy, for say, laptop hardrives on the ISS.   
      
   X-rays are not a significant problem for the magnetic materials in hard-drives.   
   The reason people worry about running hard-drives through airport security   
   is that they are afraid the _magnetic fields_ inside the apparatus will wipe   
   the magnetic disk.   
      
      
   -- Gordon D. Pusch   
      
   perl -e '$_ = "gdpusch\@NO.xnet.SPAM.com\n"; s/NO\.//; s/SPAM\.//; print;'   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)