ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

[mourningstar625]

I got a computer in recently and it had a bunch of bad caps so I decided to replace them. First pic is all the caps removed, I mostly pulled them off the board with needle nose then removed the legs after.

Other three pics are to show the location of them, and to maybe see if I need to replace any more.

I ordered these as a replacement:

http://www.digikey.com/product-searc...s=UHZ0J182MPM6

Did I get the right part? Should I do anything else like check the power supply caps

[stj]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

broken digikey link.

you want very low esr for those.
something like rubycon mcz

[mourningstar625]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

updated digikey link. Also checked the power supply caps, they looked very good.

[stj]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

datasheet looks good.
are they the same diameter?

[c_hegge]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

Those caps will work fine. I'd recommend replacing at least the three bigger ones near the rear IO ports while you're at it. They are the same brand and series as the ones that failed.

We also have a kit for that exact board here - https://www.badcaps.net/store/produc...roducts_id=161. It contains all of the caps

[mourningstar625]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

I didn't see those kits. they look good and I am assuming they are high quality caps ?

I tried to buy it but its asking to make another account for the store, I was wondering if the store in the US ?

[mariushm]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

Yes, the store is in the US.

Yes, the forum account is just for forum. You need to create another account for the store, enter your address, whatever else you need to do.

[mourningstar625]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

I know usually on caps the longer wire coming from the cap is positive, but on the board how do I tell? I am pretty sure that the side with the lines running through it is the positive but can anyone confirm?

[mariushm]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

As far as I know, only with LEDs the rule about longer lead being positive applies.

Capacitors have a strip with "-" signs on the side with the negative lead.
The motherboard has a partially filled circle on the pcb where the capacitor goes. The half filled section is on the side with the negative lead pretty much on all boards with one exception : Asus and Asrock love to put that drawing the other way around, so for the boards made by them, the filled section of the circle is positive.

Either way... 99.99999% of the times, a motherboard or a device only uses ONE version, not both... you can look on your motherboard at one capacitor and if the negative strip of the capacitor is aligned with the filled section of the circle on the pcb, then you can be sure everywhere the filled circle means negative lead goes there.

In your case, the motherboard seems to follow the standard convention: the hashed/filled section of the circle is negative.

Another simple way you can generally test is with the continuity function of your meter.

Put meter on continuity and one of the leads of your meter on something that's obviously connected to ground : the metal rings around the holes used to screw the motherboard to the case, the metal on the network or usb connectors on the back of the board, or the pins in the 4pin cpu connector in which the black wires go in.
The other lead of your multimeter you can put on one of the holes the capacitor goes in (use a thin wire and touch wire with probe if the probe tip doesn't touch the metal in the hole).
If you get continuity, then that hole is connected to ground, so that means the negative side of the capacitor is supposed to go inside that hole.

[mourningstar625]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

So i got my order of caps today and installed most of them, however I was curious about the positive negative thing so I googled it and I found this video which has the same pattern as mine but he says in the video that postive and negative are switched:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pY65TSTv31M

Any insight on this? I put installed all the caps with the "stripe" on the side of the circle that had a pattern on them. I don't want to apply power until I am 100% sure.

[mariushm]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

That's because the board in the video is an Asus M2N68-LA, Asus made the custom board for HP.

Like I said, Asus and Asrock (both were part of Pegatron group, some engineers from Asus left and started Asrock) put the drawing on the pcb the other way around.

And by the way, he's soldering the capacitors incorrectly! He's puts some solder on the iron tip and then applies the solder to the leads, which is WRONG. By doing it like that, he's burning up all the flux inside the solder wire which is supposed to remove the oxides from the leads and the motherboard hole so the soldering he does is not good, it can break easily and cause problems in the future.
The proper way to do it is to put the iron tip to make contact with the lead and the hole and then bring the solder wire to the place where iron top and lead and hole make contact, so that the flux melts first attacking the surface, and then the actual solder pours in and makes good connection.

Watch at least these two videos below, and if you have time it would be worth watching the other videos in the series:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIT4ra6Mo0s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AY5M-lGxvzo

The videos look dated, but trust me the information is still valid.

[mourningstar625]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

so I got all my caps in and soldered and the board lives! thanks for all the help.

[mourningstar625]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

It's been a while but I have been pulling my hair out about this, after recapping the board everything works okay except the Sata connectivity. It seems really slow like doing anything that requires the connection takes 10-100x longer than usual. I can use various boot utilities such as hirens and parted magic that work just fine, but say installing windows 7 takes 2-3 hours. Then going to start up windows 7 takes about 20 minutes to get to the desktop.

I hate to give up on this but does anyone have a suggestion ?

[c_hegge]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

^
I've seen that several times on these boards. Unfortunately, the caps are not the only flaw with them. The chipsets also have known design flaws, as did all nvidia chipsets until this point. It may very well be that the SATA controller in the chipset is faulty.

[mourningstar625]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

So the best option is to give up on the old board ? Or is there something else I can replace, I'm not the best at surface mount but I'm sure I can get the hang of it.

[momaka]

Re: ECS HP AMD motherboard bad caps

I have one of these boards as well, though mine is with the 4 memory slots (ECS MCP61PM-AM).

My LAN doesn't always come on. The network device disappears from Device Manager. Only after the computer has warmed up for a few minutes, I can "Scan for Hardware Changes" and pick it up.

So I believe what c_hegge mentioned is correct: these motherboards have an nVidia chipset (GeForce 6100/6150) that like to die over time - sometimes very slowly, like in my case (has take a few months before the issue started getting worse and worse). My motherboard still works, but I am affraid there is nothing I can do about the chipset.

I think the best course of action for you would be to get a PCI SATA card and connect your hard drives to that. Also, to prevent further "slow death" of the GeForce 6100/6150 chipset, I suggest you add a small fan on top of the chipset's heatsink or a large fan nearby. Keeping it cool will definitely help. And if you have a spare PCI-E graphics card, put it in that computer - it will relieve the chipset from doing graphics duty, and that should further lower its temperature. A lowly Radeon X1300, HD2400, HD3450, HD4350, and HD4550 (or nVidia equivalent if you prefer... just stay away from GeForce 7x00 and 8x00 series as they have the same problem as your chipset) can be gotten for a very low price online, especially used (i.e. eBay). I have a HD2400 in mine, and it's 100x better than the 6100/6150 integrated graphics. Not to mention it has H.264 decoding - this relieves the CPU quite a bit on YouTube and other online video websites.