Strobe Meltdown

[HotnCold]

That reverse polarity will get ya everytime - That stinks - i dont know if there is anything that mike can do for ya - I would imagine they can tell if it was plugged in backwards.... Expensive mistake - but im sure that others have done it - and i am also sure that you will not make that mistake again. Good luck - and the quark 125 has had nothing but good reviews.

[BrianG]

Yeah, that does suck. Technically though, there really is no need for that to happen. FETs generally simply do not conduct if wired backwards, but they don't blow, so those are more or less safe. The parts that blow are probably the electrolytic capacitors and the controller circuits. The caps are really easy to replace as long as they aren't surface mounted. The controller circuits could easily be protected by a simple diode, especially since those circuits aren't high current. IMO, it's simply bad engineering for the most part...