Asus A7N8X Deluxe - 1 bad capacitor, 1 close to bad - but still runs

[m3thlot]

About a year and a half ago my comp started requiring many restarts to boot up due to the image on the screen being all out of wack. In my experience this was always a telltale sign of videocard failure. I took my video card (ATI 9700 All in Wonder) out of my machine and tested it in a friends computer. It worked and so I wondered what the culprit could be. I checked my BIOS and realized that my +5 voltage was running way under the threshold (~4.5v) and then I thought it was the power supply. I got an RMA on the power supply and things worked and I thought my troubles had ended.

Then about 2 months ago the video problems started up again. I thought to myself there was no way that I had gotten 2 bad power supplies and opened up my machine to see if I could identify anything wrong. Someone had mentioned to me about capacitors (which before coming to this site I knew next to nothing about) and sure enough there was some corrosion on the top of one of them.

My question is what should I do with these - I read Alex77's post and he seemed to be having the exact same problem as me (although from the looks of it he had it significantly worse.)

Here are the images of whats inside of my case:


As you can see there is only one capacitor that has corrosion:


Apparently Nichicon is a notorious brand for failure?


These capacitors that are in focus are good - the one at the end has a *slight* bludge on the top.


Once again its not really in focus, but there is a slight bludge on top of the rear capacitor.


This one is in here for the heck of it - figures that my computer would go all haywire when I was looking up help for the problem.


My question is should I just flick off the corrosion on the top of that one capacitor, or should I avoid doing that and just leave it the way it is?

Any sort of help as to how I should go about trying to fix this would be much appreciated. Thank you in advance.

[Fatal0E]

Re: Asus A7N8X Deluxe - 1 bad capacitor, 1 close to bad - but still runs

Replace all those capacitors before it blows out your video card.

[kc8adu]

Re: Asus A7N8X Deluxe - 1 bad capacitor, 1 close to bad - but still runs

nichicon hn/hm are known badcaps.
so are the ost in the pic.
btw if you have an ant problem you found the hill!
had a gx270 with all the caps vented like that.everyone that saw it on my bench said look at the volcanoes or anthills.

[m3thlot]

Re: Asus A7N8X Deluxe - 1 bad capacitor, 1 close to bad - but still runs

So can I simply chip off the 'ant hill' off of the top of that capacitor, or will that make the system behave even worse?

[Rainbow]

Re: Asus A7N8X Deluxe - 1 bad capacitor, 1 close to bad - but still runs

That will NOT help you. You need to replace the bad caps.

[tazwegion]

Re: Asus A7N8X Deluxe - 1 bad capacitor, 1 close to bad - but still runs

Yeah, once the capacitance fluid has changed to gas expanded and/or leaked... that capacitor's cactus, with high resistance and low capacitance ability

[pentium]

Re: Asus A7N8X Deluxe - 1 bad capacitor, 1 close to bad - but still runs

your video card is screaming for mercy via pinstripe of death.
As mentioned, replace the caps soon or you will lose the card....possibly more.

[m3thlot]

Re: Asus A7N8X Deluxe - 1 bad capacitor, 1 close to bad - but still runs

I'm new to this entire capacitor thing - is there a specific model that I need to get in order to replace them? What are the specs on the type of capacitor that I need? Also, after reading some posts on the forums here I've heard that the Rubycon capacitors are really good - I went to the three sites that were suggested in the FAQ section, but I found it hard to purchace specific capacitors. Any help with this would also be much appreciated.

[Operandi]

Re: Asus A7N8X Deluxe - 1 bad capacitor, 1 close to bad - but still runs

Nichicon is a well regarded cap brand, but they have had problems with a few particular lines.

The brown substance on top of the cap is not corrosion; it is the actual contents of the forcing it's way out the top of the vent, just fyi.

Going by your excellent pics (what cam btw?) you need capacitors of 6.3volts, 3300uf (capacitance), with very low ESR (resistance), they look like 10mm in size. If you are in the USA finding caps with those specs isn't easy (unless they are 12mm); I know because I looked and couldn't.

The owner of this site (Topcat) can provide high-quality replacements for the harder to find values and sizes. I received a bunch of 6.3v, 3300uf, Rubycon MBZ for my AOpen board from him a few weeks ago.