What is ‘Rugged’ Technology?

What is Rugged Technology?

Rugged Technology is a marketing term for hardware that is designed to operate in extremely harsh environments and conditions. There are three generally accepted levels of ruggedization:semi-rugged, fully-rugged and ultra-rugged. The levels describe a product’s ability to survive drops, vibration, dust, immersion and extreme temperatures.

Semi-rugged devices, which are increasingly being called business-rugged by marketers, are usually enhanced versions of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware. The components are the same, but they are protected better.  For example, a semi-rugged laptop might have a thicker case, a gel-mounted hard disk drive and a spill-resistant keyboard. Fully-ruggeddevices are designed from the inside-out to work in extreme temperatures, to be impervious to being dropped, to resist shocks and vibrations and to be dustproof and waterproof. A fully-rugged laptop may have a solid state hard drive, which has no moving parts, runs cool and doesn’t need for a fan. (another moving part that adds weight to the device.)  Ultra-rugged devices, which are usually designed to meet precise specifications for military use, are made to handle the harshest environmental conditions. An ultra-rugged laptop can be left out in a sandstorm, frozen in a blizzard or sent on a vibrating rocket into space without any detrimental effects. 

If you already know this information then why not check out our latest new job where your mission will be to assist organisations optimise their mobile productivity with rugged technology that can enable C4I.

– whatis.techtarget.com