Bruce, Yes, handheld products definitely are susceptable to ESD hits. In a previous job, I had to take a portable data collection terminal thru EMC and safety and our biggest challenge was getting the product to take an 8kV hit and not damage it or cause it to reset itself. The ESD problem occurred whenever the user walked across the carpet and picked up the unit.
At first my co-workers were skeptical about this requirement but after attending a business show with prototype units we quickly discovered that we had to discharge ourselves before picking up a unit; otherwise it would reset itself and have to have its software reloaded. Even after meeting the 8kV requirement, we still had an occasional reset occur if the units were in a dry environment (i.e. Minnesota in the winter) and the user walked across carpet prior to picking up the unit. Regards, Debbie Olson Boca Research
