Bad components disabling cmputers around the world

Toronto Star ^ | Fri Feb 21, 2003 | RACHEL ROSS

[Noumenon]

Uh oh. These caps are used in plenty of other places. A cautionary note to consipracy buffs, though: never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by stupidity.

[Noumenon]

Here's another reference: Blown and Leaking Motherboard Capacitors - A Serious Problem?

[js1138]

Interesting, but the cost of a new motherboard is under a hundred dollars. It would take at least half an hour of labor to remove a motherboard, make the repair, and replace it (assuming you have the specialized soldering equipment and skill to work on a multilayer board). That doesn't include diagnostic time and time lost to boards the have unrecoverable faults.

I've seen dozens of dead motherboards, but never one with any visible defect.

[scab4faa]

Well I hope my PC doesn't burn out anytime time....BZZZZZ... POP...

[Myrddin]

Great news. I've got 3 new MSI motherboards. I had always stayed with Asus in the past. In the days I worked doing electronics repair, I've seen a cap explode inside a VHF FM radio. There was yellow fuzz all over the inside of the box. I found a little rubber gasket and two wires sticking up where the capacitor was mounted. I also tracked down the can. After replacing the cap, the radio worked fine.

The "kaboom" of a failing cap can be quite invigorating. My big 12 VDC power supply had a 30,000 mfd electrolytic cap. I had it mounted with the terminals upward. A brownish insulating cap held the terminals and a small black cork in the center. One of the silicon diodes failed and applied the AC current from the transformer to the cap. I head a loud pop and immediately unplugged the power supply. The black cork was gone and the insulator was cracked upward with 3 big cracks. I found the black cork embedded in the ceiling.

[Ramius]

I'm shocked... shocked... that any component could suffer thia sort of failure...

[Noumenon]

True enough, mobos are pretty cheap. It's the potential ubiquity of this issue that's of concern. Having bee no nthe manufacturing side of computer hardware, I can say that this sort of scenario isn't outside the realm of possibility.

I use Chaintech and Tyan motherboards at home, and nary a problem. F5 Networks has used ASUS and Tyan for their products, and I can say that while the gear may have had problems with compact flash memory and power supplies, I never saw this particular problem while I was there.

Time will tell.

[PFKEY]

In school we used to grab a hold of these caps with a pair of needle nose pliars and stick them in the ac outlet. Invigorating!

[toast]

These caps are used in plenty of other places.

You're right.
I also work in electronics. We build medical devices. The consequences of a failed capacitor can be much more serious than a flaky mother board.

[disclaimer]

Anyone know an Internet site that reviews motherboards and having user chats as well. I know of Motherboards.com, but I'm looking for user reviews without a sales conflict of interest.

Would like a good reliable MB for a Pentium 1.5GHz processor 512MB max RAM at least. Sounds easy, but I don't want to buy a motherboard only to find out it as slow I/O or something odd. Less than $100 would be nice as well.

[fourdeuce82d]

Gary Headlee has replaced some 40,000 leaky capacitors on almost 1,500 computer motherboards over the past year

didn't read the entire post. Question- 40K/year equals >100 replacements/day. Does this seem reasonable? Maybe it is, I don't know, please don't firebomb my house. Just asking.

[Ouachita]

I like the forums at anandtech.com for that sort of info.

[1_Of_We]

Just a thought: If the capacitor manufacturers carefully controlled the time it took for the capacitor to fail - say 1 week after the warranty expires - it could be called 'planned obsolesence', which in turn could be construed as 'an economic stimulus'. Just what we need...

[1_Of_We]

Just a thought: If the capacitor manufacturers carefully controlled the time it took for the capacitor to fail - say 1 week after the warranty expires - it could be called 'planned obsolesence', which in turn could be construed as 'an economic stimulus'. Just what we need...

[LouD]

Somewhere, there's a trial lawyer reading this and thinking "Hmmm...There must be someone we can sue for this."

[hoosierskypilot]

Why aren't you using ASUS, anymore? Before you answer, let me say I'm having a computer built with an ASUS motherboard, so give me some good news. :)

[strela]

I don't see what all the hoo-hah is about these caps. Letting the smoke out of electronic components has become an art form among some.

[cowtowney]

I've got 5 Asus boards and all are fine. Getting ready to build with 4 more. Like them a lot.

[GirlShortstop]

A cautionary note to consipracy buffs, though: never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by stupidity.

... or explained by greed.