Dell 9200 KZGs and other caps

[wildstoo]

During the COVID-19 lockdown I've been entertaining myself by dragging out old stuff from storage and playing with it. My grandfather's old Dell Dimension 9200 has been cluttering the basement for a few years since he passed away, so I decided to drag it out and try to get it working.

Although it was pretty clean inside, I soon discovered that it wasn't completely stable, and a quick look over the board confirmed some caps that are obviously bad.



I know there are several threads that discuss this model but they're all from 7-9 years ago and the recommended replacements don't seem to be manufactured anymore.

I went ahead and ordered a few of these Panasonic FJ, without really thinking about whether they were suitable or not:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/283196440767

I'm guessing they're not ideal replacements? I kinda jumped the gun in ordering them (should have posted here first!)

So, my questions are:

1. What would you recommend using to replace the bulging/leaking KZGs in the picture?
   
2. Are there any caps on the 9200 board that I should replace apart from the KZGs, considering the board is now 13 years old? I'm particularly concerned about clean power to the PCI-E slot (most of the crashes occurred after I swapped out the graphics card).

UK-based suppliers would be best. I've purchased from Farnell before but I'm willing to buy from wherever, really.

I realise that recapping a board for a totally average 13 year old consumer-grade PC seems a bit silly, but it's not like I have a lot of other stuff to do right now, and repairing stuff can be satisfying.

Thanks for reading!

[Topcat]

Re: Dell 9200 KZGs and other caps

They will be fine if they are genuine..... Ebay is a cesspool of knockoffs & fakes. They appear real in the pics....but no guarantees that's what you'll receive. Check them closely!

[stj]

Re: Dell 9200 KZGs and other caps

panasonic FR's from rs would be best,
FJ is suspicious, afaik they are old and only sold to motherboard factories.

[wildstoo]

Re: Dell 9200 KZGs and other caps

Thanks for the reply. The replacement caps just arrived.

What do you think? Genuine or not?

[Per Hansson]

Re: Dell 9200 KZGs and other caps

They look genuine but they are probably old stock.
It would be good to reform them, I have had known good capacitors fail after a few months of use when they have been in storage for (10+ years)
But do take a look in the power supply as well.
As coincidence would have it I had to recap a Dimension 9200 PSU just a few weeks ago.
It would not power up after a power outage: many of the small caps where completely dried out...

[wildstoo]

Re: Dell 9200 KZGs and other caps

Thanks for the advice. I didn't reform them as I don't have the components to build a circuit that would accomplish this, and even if I did, I wouldn't be able to measure any change in the caps to confirm that they're good or not.

Anyway, they're in place now and the system is working at least, but it was still unstable UNTIL I replaced the PSU. I had a 1000w Corsair PSU lying around unused for a couple of years and I've just about managed to jam it into the case (the placement of the C14 plug is not ideal for this case - it's too close to the edge so the case overlaps it).

Anyway, 1000w PSU is obviously overkill for this system, but previously the system would freeze or BSOD intermittently when running 3DMark06. Since I put the new PSU in, no problems whatsoever.

I could crack open the Dell PSU - I'm sure the caps in there are toast, as you said - but I might as well just throw a new PSU in there instead. 400-500w would be more than enough for this rig.

Anyway, thanks again for the advice and help, even if I didn't heed all of it.

Edit: couldn't help myself; opened the Dell PSU to take a look. The caps don't LOOK bad it's hard to tell because there's loads of hotglue over almost every component. It would be a pain in the ass to work on, so I'm not going to. This PSU is going to the big recycling facility in the sky.

Edit 2: damn. thing just crashed after 9th run of 3DMark06. it's more stable with the other PSU but still not 100%.

[Uranium-235]

Re: Dell 9200 KZGs and other caps

Bad PSU's tend to cause caps to go bad, but KZG's are inherently shit you want to replace anyways

[wildstoo]

Re: Dell 9200 KZGs and other caps

Thanks. Yeah, the KZGs are gone and the Panny FJs seem to be doing OK. Turns out the old Dell PSU might actually be OK too.

The instability was actually caused by a buggy nVidia driver. Yep, the last supported Windows XP driver for the Geforce 730GT causes the card to lock up.

Rolled back to a slightly older driver and it's 100% stable. Ran 3DMark06 on a loop for almost 4 hours and it was fine.

I'll just leave the 1000w supply in there because.. I'm lazy :P