"Waterproofing" the small electronics.

Dear tourists:

Here are my experiences. Your mileage may vary.

After a rainy, rainy brevet in 2008 where my cell phone got flooded out, 
I took to putting it in a plastic sandwich bag. It didn't flood out 
again, just died one day.

Even thought they come with "professional sort of gear" looking black 
nylon zippered cases, I frequently use sealing plastic bags around the 
cases of my glucose meters. This caused all sorts of nasty language at 
some airport with the TSA right when the whole pint sized sandwich bag 
for the three one ounce fluid rule came out. The TSA person thought the 
quart bag was in and of itself a no-no, and adding a vial of liquid (I 
had the usual little tiny vial of glucose control solution for checking 
meter accuracy in there, somewhere) made me person most likely to be 
strip-searched. I don't recall ever flooding out a glucose meter, though 
I might have.

NOTE: I don't blame the TSA person -- they had EXCEPTIONALLY BAD 
training materials (third generation photocopies of ungrammatical text 
with uninformative illustrations) on this, and the staff itself, 
supervisors and all, was divided on what the stuff really meant.

There are gasket-sealed plastic boxes available from several 
manufacturers (Pelican is one that is often seen). For specific items, 
such as cameras, I'd see what those in that trade have to offer. Please 
note the issues with waterproof/waterresisting use differ from those of 
waterproof/resistant storage.

I was once caught in a rainstorm while walking -- and my Alphasmart note 
taker stayed dry enough inside its neoprene sleeve. Please note the 
Alphasmarts were/are pretty tough, and designed to be user-serviceable 
to some extent (hey, they even printed a smiley face on the 
"motherboard!"). The same may  not happen with a small conventional 
laptop or "netbook."

Robert Leone