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    Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

    This forum has been very helpful to me. I've had it
    bookmarked for years but only joined recently. I'm
    looking for some wisdom from your collective experience.

    This weekend I recapped two FIC FB11 motherboards.
    One had been running my office server for eight years
    and became unstable last spring (2009). It had
    developed bad RAM once before that. The second is
    a spare that started failing a couple of weeks ago
    with ATA errors and freezing up once a day or so,
    though it had been running only since May.
    This spare had a bulging 1000uF cap that seemed
    suggestive to me, so I decided to recap both in
    hopes that they would then be fine. (I had contacted
    Topcat about recapping with Rubycons but got anxious
    this weekend because I have one last spare running
    now and that board seems to be starting to generate
    Adaptec 2940UW SCSI timeouts, which is what the
    others started doing before they failed. Perhaps I
    shouldn't have been so hasty!)

    One board had ten 1500uF 6.3v I.Q. caps on the VRM
    and ten 1000uF 10v Teapo SEK caps, and a number of
    330uF and smaller Teapo SEK and SS caps. These
    all seem to be general purpose 105 C rated caps.
    The other board had the 10 I.Q. caps but the rest
    were S.I. brand. I don't know the ESR rating of the
    I.Q. caps, but I replaced them by some Nichicon PWs.
    I replaced the 1000uF caps by Nichicon HMs, and for
    good measure I replaced the rest of the smaller caps
    with Nichicon P- or H-series caps too.

    The recap seemed to have gone well in that memtest86+
    ran fine for several hours on each board. However,
    when I try to run my OS, NEXTSTEP 3.3, on the test
    bench, both boards are similarly unstable. They both
    develop ATA errors with two different HDs and two
    different cables. These errors are not present on one
    board at boot up but start after the system has been
    running for a while, say 15 minutes. In addition, the
    original board does not recognize the PS/2 mouse.

    NEXTSTEP puts great stress on the hardware and I've
    found that some boards that are stable under Windows
    are unstable under NEXTSTEP, so it doesn't seem odd
    that a program like memtest86+ would run fine while
    NEXTSTEP does not.

    I'm hoping that someone on this forum can give me a
    hint on what might be going on. The common hardware
    between the two test setups consists of the P/S,
    the CPU, a stick of SDRAM, the monitor, keyboard, and
    mouse. It doesn't depend on the hard drive or the
    cable, though both cables could be bad. I'm not sure
    that the P/S is all that good; it's a brand new AGI unit
    that came with the server case, which I swapped out
    for a better unit when I originally built the server. It
    does test OK with a small ATX P/S tester but I've not
    put it on a scope.

    I'm wondering what the problem could be! Perhaps
    I have some solder joints that are cold even though
    they look good, or perhaps, despite being careful,
    I've damaged my boards, or maybe low impedance
    caps outside of the VRM make the ATA controller
    unstable, or maybe I need lower impedance caps
    on the VRM than the Nichicon PWs. I could
    try a different P/S, RAM, and CPU, too, since
    they are common to both boards.

    It's been a while--about thirty years--since I've
    repaired delicate electronic equipment, and the
    last time I had a full schematic! It's somewhat
    uncomfortable working without full information.

    Any ideas?

    #2
    Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

    have you tried running prime95 on the board? It stresses the CPU, VRM, northbridge, and memory pretty well, as long as you configure it to rotate the FFT sizes.. I'd also verify the polarity of the new capacitors that you installed.. memtest86 works the memory pretty hard, but the cpu and other parts, not so much..

    As for Nextstep, what kind of errors is it giving? Might also check the PSU that you're operating the system with, it could just be old or need recapping too.. After 8 years, i wouldn't be surprised..

    Comment


      #3
      Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

      Originally posted by gg1978
      have you tried running prime95 on the board? It stresses the CPU, VRM, northbridge, and memory pretty well, as long as you configure it to rotate the FFT sizes.. I'd also verify the polarity of the new capacitors that you installed.. memtest86 works the memory pretty hard, but the cpu and other parts, not so much..

      As for Nextstep, what kind of errors is it giving? Might also check the PSU that you're operating the system with, it could just be old or need recapping too.. After 8 years, i wouldn't be surprised..
      Thanks for the help, gg1978.

      I have not run prime95; I don't have Windows, and even if I did, the problem with the ATA controller has started to get worse--sometimes the BIOS will not see a hard drive on boot up. The "good" thing is that the problem is consistent, with each board showing ATA errors. I thought that I smelled something getting warm this afternoon while testing but nothing felt warm to the touch. I'm doubting that I could even get Windows to boot up now.

      I'm getting several errors in NEXTSTEP. Sometimes they happen after the system has come up, but now they come earlier during the boot process. Sometimes the controller resets the drives (I believe the error is 0xc8) and hangs, and sometimes there's a read error. There was even an error when I tried to run memtest under DOS from a floppy, when I got an error that DOS couldn't write to some "device." (I've forgotten what it was, some three letter "device" that I've never seen before. I got the "abort, fail?" dialog loop and had to cycle the power.)

      I'm now becoming more certain that it's either a bad PSU, or the boards don't like low ESR caps in the smaller capacitances. I've ordered another PSU to test with and if that's inconclusive, I'm going to replace the caps 1000 uF and smaller with quality 105 C general purpose caps.

      Comment


        #4
        Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

        i have never seen a board react badly to too good caps.putting in gp caps is a big mistake.
        btw mersenne prime or mprime is the linux prime95.
        its on ubcd and hirens iirc.
        check that psu and report back.better yet post pics of its insides.

        Comment


          #5
          Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

          Probably PSU secondary caps or failing PSU fan, which can cause these symptoms when the PSU heats up.

          Comment


            #6
            Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

            Agree - Check PSU including the caps.

            SI are I-SING Electronic Co [TW].
            For 50v and less they really only make one series of cap.
            They are low ESR rated a tad lesser than Panasonic FC or Nichicon PW.
            http://www.i-sing.com.tw/impedance.htm
            They go bad but not like in droves.

            I.Q are Interquip Group. [Note: It's "I.Q" not "I.Q." - I do that too.]
            That would be company formed by a group of separate companies to handle distribution and sales of electronic parts.
            [Kind of like if Western Digital, Gigabyte, Crucial, Viewsonic and some others got together and opened a store to sell PC parts.]
            OST made at least some of their lytic caps.
            They go bad with regularity.
            I dunno where to get data sheets so I'd -fail up- and use something like MBZ.

            Teapo SEK are low ESR but just barely. Roughly comparable to Nichicon VZ Series so FC or PW would be an upgrade. [Teapo SS are GP.]
            Their QC seems to be hit and miss. Sometimes okay forever and other times they fail in droves. You don't want to see them in a VRM.

            Sometimes those small 4 and 5 mm lytics are what will bite you.
            Few people check those because failures are rare but if they do go they can hose up signaling to/from the chipset and the other IC's [drive controllers for example] as well as throw Vtt out of spec.

            .
            Mann-Made Global Warming.
            - We should be more concerned about the Intellectual Climate.

            -
            Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.

            - Dr Seuss
            -
            You can teach a man to fish and feed him for life, but if he can't handle sushi you must also teach him to cook.
            -

            Comment


              #7
              Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

              I got a few minutes today before I left work to check on the PSU. I opened it up and took pictures, which I have attached. Visually, the PSU looks just fine--almost new, in fact. Although it is several years old, this PSU is nearly unused. It has less than twenty power-on hours. I've not used it in a machine; it came with a case but I didn't trust it in a server and installed a better PSU in that case instead. Testing my recap job is the only serious work it has ever done.

              The PSU seems to have Teapo caps in it from what I can see easily. The wires get in the way of seeing the smaller caps. I don't have an ESR meter to test them further. I'm going to try to find yet another IDE cable to test with, and also take a look at the power on the Molex drive connectors on the PSU. The new PSU I've ordered should arrive soon and then I can test the FB11 with it.

              kc8adu and PCBONEZ, you've made me feel more confident of the recap job. Do you think that perhaps having Nichicon PWs in the VRM is a problem?

              I hope the attachments come through in the post. I'm sorry that I don't know how to embed them in the posting.
              Attached Files

              Comment


                #8
                Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

                Press down the center of black center of the two black capacitors in that PSU do you feel any dome or "pip"?

                Reason I ask these black discs tend to bludge, pressing firmly test helps you to confirm.

                Also you may want to suspect the teapo capacitors as well.

                Cheers, Wizard

                Comment


                  #9
                  Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

                  Originally posted by Wizard
                  Press down the center of black center of the two black capacitors in that PSU do you feel any dome or "pip"?

                  Reason I ask these black discs tend to bludge, pressing firmly test helps you to confirm.

                  Also you may want to suspect the teapo capacitors as well.

                  Cheers, Wizard
                  Wizard, when I push down on the black disks I feel just a flat surface beneath them. The black capacitors are Teapos. My PSU tester says the PSU is good, but there is no great load on the PSU while it tests.

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

                    pw is not low enough esr to hold up and i bet vcore is a bit noisy.
                    if it is unstable you will need better caps.
                    Originally posted by tj2
                    I got a few minutes today before I left work to check on the PSU. I opened it up and took pictures, which I have attached. Visually, the PSU looks just fine--almost new, in fact. Although it is several years old, this PSU is nearly unused. It has less than twenty power-on hours. I've not used it in a machine; it came with a case but I didn't trust it in a server and installed a better PSU in that case instead. Testing my recap job is the only serious work it has ever done.

                    The PSU seems to have Teapo caps in it from what I can see easily. The wires get in the way of seeing the smaller caps. I don't have an ESR meter to test them further. I'm going to try to find yet another IDE cable to test with, and also take a look at the power on the Molex drive connectors on the PSU. The new PSU I've ordered should arrive soon and then I can test the FB11 with it.

                    kc8adu and PCBONEZ, you've made me feel more confident of the recap job. Do you think that perhaps having Nichicon PWs in the VRM is a problem?

                    I hope the attachments come through in the post. I'm sorry that I don't know how to embed them in the posting.

                    Comment


                      #11
                      Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

                      Agree. - PW isn't low enough ESR or high enough Ripple to -be sure- of a stable board.

                      For a BX board at a minimum you should use Rubycon ZL or Chemicon KZE for anything 8mm or bigger -and- 470uF or over.
                      I'd use them for any 6mm over 220uF too, but that's just me...
                      [ZL and KZE are the same grade for ESR/Ripple.]
                      PW is probably okay for smaller caps than those mentioned. [If you have any.]
                      -
                      You might find even better caps are less expensive.
                      [Although KZE are usually relatively inexpensive.]
                      Happens sometimes when higher volume production drives the manufacturing costs down.

                      ~~~
                      Just FYI: Those black discs are just for insulation.
                      Matters in some applications those caps end up in where shorting other parts against the top of the cap might be a problem.

                      ~~~
                      PSU looks like it's probably fine. [And better than average these days.]
                      Teapo is usually okay in PSU's.
                      At least one of your output filter caps isn't a Teapo though.
                      The one with the plain 'X' stamped in it. - What is it?
                      .
                      Mann-Made Global Warming.
                      - We should be more concerned about the Intellectual Climate.

                      -
                      Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.

                      - Dr Seuss
                      -
                      You can teach a man to fish and feed him for life, but if he can't handle sushi you must also teach him to cook.
                      -

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

                        kc8adu and PCBONEZ,

                        I've ordered some Panasonic FM series 1500 uF, 6.3 V, 10 mm caps to replace the PWs. I'll try to find some time to put them on at least one board some weekend after they arrive. There are only ten of them to replace.

                        The FB11 board also has the following capacitors (not in the VRM):

                        ten 1000 uF 10 V, 8 x 12.5 (I put in Nichicon HMs, which just barely fit at 8 x 15),

                        eight 330 uF 16 V, 8 x 12.5 (I used Nichicon PWs, also barely fitting at 8 x 15),

                        two 220 uF, 16 V, 5 mm near the USB ports (I used Nichicon PMs),

                        three 100 uF, 16 V, 5 mm near the RAM (I used Nichicon PWs),

                        three 10 uF, 25 V, 4 mm (I used Nichicon HCs).

                        The 1000 uF and 300 uF caps are scattered around the board, mostly between the various slots, though there are some near the VRM and near the RAM, and one 330 uF right up against the CPU socket. As the 1000 uF and smaller caps were all either Teapo SEK or SS on one board, or S.I. on the other, I think these smaller Nichicons all have better specs. So, replacing the 1500 uF I.Q caps in the VRM by Panasonic FMs instead of Nichicon PWs ought to cure any problems due to bad caps.

                        I'll check on that PSU cap with the X stamped on it. It's a pain to get a look at it.

                        I wish I understood motherboard layout and design better so that I would better know the purposes of the various capacitors.

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

                          I had some time this week to test my FB11s more and found, much to my surprise, that my problem was the hard drives! One, a 10GB Fujitsu, was getting rather hot without cooling, so I must have cooked it when I was testing. One of the chips on the bottom was getting very hot. The other, a 8GB Seagate, had some corrupt data on it. Once I fixed the corrupt data on the Seagate (and put a fan on it just in case), the system booted fine and ran for several hours on each board! I'm a bonehead for not suspecting the drives earlier, but they _were_ working before I used them for testing. I'm hoping that I can find another hard drive controller board on eBay for the dying Fujitsu, but so far no luck.

                          So, now I still need to run something like mprime, or perhaps just see if the system will be stable running with the network card, SCSI card, modem, sound card, more RAM, etc.

                          My dilemma is that I received my Panasonic FM caps, which I could swap in for the Nichicon PWs in the VRM, but so far the system is stable. That could change when I get a non-minimal system up. I'm reluctant to risk the chance of physically damaging my boards by putting in the Panasonics, but I'd also hate to toast the CPU or RAM by having too much ripple. I'm hoping that I'll hear some opinions informed by similar experience. Is there a significant risk to the CPU, RAM, or add-in cards if there's a larger ripple current?

                          Comment


                            #14
                            Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

                            When you use a cap in a circuit with more ripple than the cap is designed for what happens is the -internal- temperatures of the cap go higher than they are designed to.
                            All the other specs are based on that temp not going over some limit.
                            -
                            The short version is caps that are under rated for the ripple present will overheat, dry out, and die young,,,,, taking who knows what else with them.
                            .

                            Two good drives going bad at the same time sounds rather suspect.
                            Where are your +5v and +12v at?
                            .
                            Mann-Made Global Warming.
                            - We should be more concerned about the Intellectual Climate.

                            -
                            Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.

                            - Dr Seuss
                            -
                            You can teach a man to fish and feed him for life, but if he can't handle sushi you must also teach him to cook.
                            -

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

                              I got some more time this week to work on the problems. I replaced the ten Nichicon PWs in each board's VRM with Panasonic FMs. That ought to be good enough. Both boards seem to run well afterward, but I've only had them running a couple of hours each, so more testing is in order.

                              I also measured the voltages at the rails of my testing PSU: +5V is between 4.99 and 5.00 V. +12V is at 12.31 V.

                              I too find it suspicious that both drives were good before and then had problems, but one definitely has a hardware problem, while the other had something funny about the data on the drive, which was fixable, but otherwise did not have a hardware problem. That second drive continues to run reliably now that I've fixed the odd empty files. I do think it was heat that killed my Fujitsu drive--the lab bench that the drive sat on during testing definitely does not conduct heat as well as I had thought.

                              Thanks to all who replied; I appreciate the help. I'll post more if anything else odd happens.

                              Now I have five more socket 370 boards to recap, a couple of Adaptec 2940UW SCSI cards to recap to see if it fixes them, and a recapped FIC VA-503+ that needs its BIOS flashed. I might get it all done by the new year...

                              Comment


                                #16
                                Re: Problems with recapped FIC FB11 motherboards

                                remember that fujitsu had a big run of bad ide drives.your failure should not be a surprise.and filesystem damage when board,psu,or both are run with bad caps is common.

                                Comment

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