I am the victim!!!

[RogueSnake79]

Of the "Capacitor Plague"!!!!!

My PC has been down for a month, and thats how long it took me to figure this one out. Only after testing every individual part, and RMA'n one, did I discover these damaged capacitors on my motherboard. Using a frankenstein PC that I scaped together now.

Anyway, I'm going to attempt to repair with this guide. Really got nothing to lose, so its worth a shot. Roll the die, and maybe save $100 on an old used mobo on ebay. That some chinese dude had overpriced becuse he knows they are now very rare.

Any other time of the year I would just rebuild. But I'm poor. Which some members of this board most likely previously concluded based on my poor grammer skills. And linked this to a lack of education. Which would imply a high likelihood of a low income.

Here is a wiki page on the plague. Yeah, thats a bad sign lol

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague

And the guide to repair that I found.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/fixing-motherboard,1606.html

And before I forget. Its Sean's fault.

[dejawolf]

roguesnake poor? when did this happend?

i thought you were the guy with 2 corvettes and a über-monolith supercomputer?

[Panta]

Hey RogueSnake,

If you were rich, you would be using a powerful Mac and couldn´t play SB anyway, so, what do you complain of? :diable:

[tarball]

Sounds similar to the Chinese drywall problem.

[Mogwa]

When I saw the title of this thread, I thought it was going to be started by someone else.

Mog

[ashdivay]

When I saw the title of this thread, I thought it was going to be started by someone else.

Mog

LOL Me too haha

[9erRed]

Greetings RogueSnake79,

If your going to replace all the "caps" you will want to replace them with "solid" caps (normally high quality Japanese units), a few cents more but provide very stable current and never leak or rust out.

As a side note here, who is the board manufacturer and what model? Just to know if going through all the additional trouble of this type of swap out is worth the time and money, as oppoaed to just getting a newer motherboard.

9erRed

[Sean]

Gee, I thought you were blaming the power supply. Surprise, surprise, that wasn't it!! Thus, its not my fault.

[RogueSnake79]

The board is an odd ball, the main reason I am going to try an fix it. You can't find it... anywere! Was a POS promotional item. Buy this graphics card, get the mobo free. I'm so stupid.

Socket 939

EVGA 133-K8-NF41

REV 2.2

I had been having good luck with EVGA stuff, well, their graphics cards anyway.

I'll upload a pic of the board, and damaged caps later today. Haven't got time atm. I need help finding the right replacements. I've done a lot of research on these "caps", but still I am a noob. And fear buying the wrong ones. Mainly becuse one of the labels is a little vague.

Sean, if I can't blame you who can I blame? Really, I need someone else to blame.

[[panzer]]

Just go robe some crack dealer or a lot lizard. Your lame excuses are gettting old man.

Looking foward to raping your new and improved M1(as if it will make any dif).

[Sean]

Usually the cap describes what it is from the markings on it. The capacitance spec for them has a huge tolerance, so its possible to substitute something close. You just have to make sure that its rated for the correct max voltage level. It must meet or exceed what the old one was. The markings might be 200uF, 700V - 200 microfarads, 700 volts max voltage rating. Also - these things are usually polarized. Pay attention to that, and don't reverse it.

You can find almost anything you need on digikey.

[9erRed]

Greetings,

Seems that this board is not alone in having bad caps. The "FZ" caps are the culprets. Here is a link with discussion and pic's of the same board.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://i280.photobucket.com/albums/kk177/turbostd/computer%2520stuff/computerstuff004.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.badcaps.net/forum/showthread.php%3Fp%3D85719&usg=__ltkFa6tCk0dD6bWeso7qYIaFaHw=&h=760&w=1024&sz=171&hl=en&start=8&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=eUnu0hun5yVqGM:&tbnh=111&tbnw=150&prev=/images%3Fq%3DEVGA%2B133-K8-NF41%26hl%3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox%26sa%3DN%26um%3D1

There is some discussion about the type of caps to use to replace and the specif items that are on the board.

Here is the main thread with info on the left and locations to get the stuff you'll need.

http://www.badcaps.net/pages.php?vid=12

Even have repair services.

9erRed

[RogueSnake79]

Thanks a lot guys!! Great info.

9er I can't believe you found all that. Thanks a bunch dude. No need to upload a pic now, the one in that thread is identical.

I guess I need to replace ALL these FZ bastards now. Even the ones that haven't popped. I wasn't really worried about not finding exact matching ones. But higher quality replacements. Not knowing what is the higher quality, and also not knowing if mine were solid, electrolthic, or what.

[Ssnake]

"Wet" condensators that pop will usually spray your computer with electrolyte (acidic...!), so if you found goo, that question is solved.

Higher quality... well, there is only so much that one can do to produce better condensators. Most likely the ones in your PC were not specified for the ambient temperatures in ypur PC casing, or, more precisely, they may have actually met their nominal life expectancy in this environment. You may want to look for condensators that have a life expectancy of six years or so in a 50°C temperature or something along those lines. It is usually listed in the specs of each model, provided that you can actually find the data sheet.

[koga]

Built that high speed super computer using all wal mart brand parts

[RogueSnake79]

I'm back! I fixed it!

Now, lets see how long it lasts. I ordered all the caps for the board from digkey. But, I just couldn't wait another week without doing something. I remembered the POS first gen xbox I had die on me. And wondered if it had simular caps... Sure enough it did. I replaced the bad ones with those. We will see how long the rest of the FZ bastards last. Hopefully at least a week till the package gets here with the new ones.

Not looking forward to changing a whole boards worth. Five was hard enough.

[Scorpius]

Of the "Capacitor Plague"!!!!!

My PC has been down for a month, and thats how long it took me to figure this one out. Only after testing every individual part, and RMA'n one, did I discover these damaged capacitors on my motherboard. Using a frankenstein PC that I scaped together now.

Anyway, I'm going to attempt to repair with this guide. Really got nothing to lose, so its worth a shot. Roll the die, and maybe save $100 on an old used mobo on ebay. That some chinese dude had overpriced becuse he knows they are now very rare.

Any other time of the year I would just rebuild. But I'm poor. Which some members of this board most likely previously concluded based on my poor grammer skills. And linked this to a lack of education. Which would imply a high likelihood of a low income.

Here is a wiki page on the plague. Yeah, thats a bad sign lol

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague

And the guide to repair that I found.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/fixing-motherboard,1606.html

And before I forget. Its Sean's fault.

I had a G5 imac at work about 3 years ago that had the same problem. They had to replace the mobo as it was still under warranty.

Don't feel bad dude, my C drive just died. Fortunately it gave me just enough warning signs of it's impending doom. I backed everything up on a 1TB external, and now the D drive is the new C drive. I've got firefox and word on here right now, and not much else. Have to reinstall all my software and games this weekend.

Careful when soldering... :sonic:

I rebuilt my whole machine back in May, and I love my new Gigabyte motherboard. I had originally ordered an Asus but had to send it back because it was inop.

[9erRed]

Greetings RogueSnake79,

Ref the replacement of the caps;

See if you can locate some liquid solder flux to assist in the replacement of the caps, you should use a small syringe with a blunt needle to apply the flux. The liquid flux works soooo much better than any other flux types on PCB work. It allows a smaller amount of solder to be used and "flow" much better. Also have some isopropyl alcohol to clean up the repair areas, use a small plastic bristol brush for that, it will clean up all the flux residue.

Careful as it highly flammable!

The liquid flux can normally be had in small 5 oz dispensers or smaller. And works better than paste or core impregnated material (blend is normally too acidic of PCB work). Use the flux to assist in "tinning" the solder tip before you start, and have a small damp sponge to help remove excess solder and heat from the soldering iron's tip.

Have some thin "desolder wick" avail. as it never hurts to be ready for a bit of "O Sh*t" too much solder.

You will find that using a magnifying device of some type will pay for itself after one use, I have a 4 inch magnifier with light housing on a goose arm that is just so handy for work like your about to do.

Just a few suggestions to keep a clean and neat board when your done.

Later ..... 9erRed

[Homer]

Solder for electronics already has flux embedded in it.

Acetone works better than alcohol. You can use your wife's/gf's nail polish remover.

[Ssnake]

Nail polish remover will contain acetone only if it is a really cheap brand. It removes nail polish very well, yes, but unfortunately also the upper layer of the nail itself, which is no welcome side effect. Slightly higher priced removers will usually use a combination of other chemicals to solve the nail polish without eroding the nail itself (or at least not as much).

[Homer]

...and how do you know this?

[GH_Lieste]

Beauty School drop out...?