Would a nearby lightning strike possibly fry my Axe-Fx 3’s USB socket?

I have a meter base surge protector from the power company I used to work for that serves our area.
I use at least one high dollar surge suppressor on every electronic device in the house, sometimes two for
the expensive stuff.

Yes, electrical engineers (retired) are paranoid... LoL!
 
Here in CR, power cycles many many times daily. I have my whole studio run off 2 ups's.
At first I only had a few pieces of gear run off of one ups, but now the whole shebang.
lost a Mac Pro and digital mixer before I clued in.
 
Sorry to hear about your III. Insurance is a crapshoot. I had a strike take out a Comcast DVR and nothing else. It’s always weird.

I was hit by lighting in 1984. Luckily I was neither connected to a Furman, nor had a USB. Only needed a hard reboot, and another few days of soft resets. But whenever It comes up, a smart-ass or two snap their fingers, point, and say, “ah-ha!”. Ok, you’ve read some of my posts. Who’s first?....lol.
 
I was hit by lighting in 1984.
Damn, dude! I got hit by 220 at a Halloween party gig about 32 years ago. Reached up and grabbed the mic while I was playing guitar, to adjust it an inch or two lower, and it grabbed me. Luckily, someone figured out what was happening from the giant HUMMMMMM that suddenly erupted from my amp and the PA system and yanked the mic cord out of the PA. When that happened, all the effort I was putting into letting go of the mic ended up throwing it through a lath & plaster wall. Took a pint of tequila sunrise to stop my hands from shaking....
 
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I have one of those commercial APC units for my computer and gear. Everything goes into that. Cheap insurance. Well, sort of. The batteries only last a few years. They're kind of a pain to replace.
Not as much pain as replacing all your gear!

I've even gotten in the habit of unplugging everything (at least computer-based gear) any time I'm not using it but I don't always remember. Like right now I'm traveling for work and wondering if I unplugged my other laptop, Axe, and AX8 before I left...
 
If off, was it plugged in?

Wondering if I should always have it unplugged when not in use
It was off but plugged into a regular power strip plugged into a wall outlet, with the USB connected to my iMac, which was on and plugged into a spike suppressor power strip.

I will be investing in more spike protection and a USB....
 
Beyond a certain point, there is no protection from lightning. A nearby strike can induce currents into your gear, even if it's not plugged in.
It was the closest thing to where the lightning struck, by a couple feet.
 
Have you gone into Settings > Preferences and tried to connect the ports manually?

Also check to see whether your usual computer recognizes the Axe as an audio output.
 
What sort of power ‘conditioner’ would protect the Axe? My understanding was that lightning surges are too fast to really protect against...
 
Nothing will protect against a direct lightning strike. But surge protectors can help against nearby power surges caused by nearby strikes.
 
Reading this this morning blows my mind a little. Last night I was sitting on the couch watching tv and suddenly thunder shook the house. I went down to the studio and pulled the plug on the gear and as I started back out my attention went to the USB still plugged into the computer, so I pulled it out too. Strangely I didn't unplug the computer though. I'll be plugging into an APC now after reading this tread.
 
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