Am Son, 2003-03-16 um 20.07 schrieb Tony Godshall: > On Tue, Feb 11, 2003 at 01:00:47PM -0400, Derek Broughton wrote: > > From: "Russell Coker" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > > > On Tue, 11 Feb 2003 07:15, Joris wrote: > > > > I know it has little to do with debian on laptops (altough a non-windows > > > > OS booting meight look suspecious to customs), but: > > > > > > You must have some charge in your battery when going through the security > > > checks as they will want to see the machine running. > > > > The last time I flew (Christmas) they didn't care about powering it up - but > > they actually used some kind of sniffer. I always thought it would be > > trivial > > to fill a laptop with explosives and enough ROM & battery to make it look > > like > > it was working. So this time they didn't care that it 'worked', and > > actually > > checked for bombs. Still, just-in-case, make sure it will boot before going > > through. That time I'd just spent an hour getting the damn thing to start > > because I was having trouble with a flakey touchpad, and they didn't even > > want > > me to turn it on :-) > > > > > Often they will wait for it to "boot Windows" and you have to explain to > > > them > > > that is never going to happen and that it runs Linux. > > > > Never had that happen in Canada. > > I fly every week or two in the US and went to Europe and > Mexico too in the last year. Never had to turn on my laptop > but they usually do the cotton wipe explosive-residue detect > thing to my laptop, its bag, and sometimes my shoes. They > used to want to see stuff turned on, but appears to have > become a thing of the past. > > My laptops have gone through xray lots of times but the only > things they have failed from are not attributable to that. > The greater hazards for a laptop are physical, IMHO.
Have you ever seen the explosion of shortened battery packs? Several companies I.E. Dell had to call back battery-packs. When a battery pack is sealed and waterproof then changes in air-pressure move the membrane-like case. In special cases these movements combined with vibration can cause internal contacts to break and to shorten a battery pack. The suddenly released energy makes smoke coming out of the luggage tray. That effect already caused several known rescue-landings although there was no terrorist on board. Please take care. Cu Hugo
