VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

[Brewster]

Hey Guys, First I want to thank all of you for the excellent info on this site.
This is my first post but I've lurked here for awhile. I have a P4PB400 that I purchased from a surplus vendor that was full of GSC craps. Following the info here I replaced everything 1000uF and up.(40 capacitors) On first boot, it POST'ed perfectly and has been flawless for about 3 weeks. Now I'm getting random freezes and it may take 3-10 reboots to get it up.Although I've been a tech for 20+ years motherboards are new to me. Especially without a schematic.
There are a few small caps I didn't replace 1-330uF/10v ,1-33uF/16v, 2-100uf/16v,3-22uF/25v. Could these create the problems I'm having? Any advise how to proceed would be great.

[Spacedye69]

Re: VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

Welcome from OHIO!(Ohio sucks, you should move ) If you have access to an ESR meter, you could check them. Its possible they can be causing problems. Just to be safe, I have a habit of replacing all electolytics, no matter the size.

[Per Hansson]

Re: VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

It is also very possible that it is a PSU problem

Have you checked the caps in the PSU too?

[Brewster]

Re: VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

Spaced- Ohio's not so bad.Where else can you have all 4 seasons in the same month? I don"t have an ESR meter,Just a DMM.
Per-
As for the PSU, it's a Sparkle 300W with Capxon brand caps. Less than a year old but no signs of leakage on the caps

[starfury1]

Re: VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

the VRM caps are probably the most critical and should be replace with Low ESR types
I assume you used low esr types and your soldering after 20 years should be up to scratch.
replacing the others might be an idea but doubt they would be the problem
(possible thought)

The thing is it was working ok so what went wrong....possibly memory hard disk biting the dust
Heat issues are also another possibility
windows infected (thats if you are using windows) or maybe some corruption of bios or the bios set at hyper drive ...but think you would have notice issues with that in less then 3 weeks
(I take it you cleard it and reset it after recap)

Working on that assumption all is well with the recap
(and thats not to say it is but with your experience I assume theres a good chance its ok)
Rechecking it wouldn't hurt thought


The thing now is to work out exactly whats playing up
Is it a pure HW or possibly a SW issue

it helps if you have a lot of spare hw thought memory HDD psu to switch around with

"The rebooting it 3-10 times"
may be a key here...does it hang and at what point?
is it near the same point each time

I guess one way to rule out windows SW would be to carefully replace the HDD without as much as possible disturbing MB or cards then trying a fresh OS install

I would try few other things

Did you load up any new program when it started playing up?
Do a virus and anti spyware scan
Try running windows in fail safe mode
reset the bios and run it at fail safe mode.
re seat memory and run a memory checking program.

Windows does have error logs which may help but
(somewhere forgotten were they)
but don't count on them providing the ultimate right answer but they may help locate the area

Supply as pointed out would be my first port of call, you seem to have ruled that out

BTW was it a well used MB or a new old stock type board
some boards have been known to be prone to dry joints
(maybe the beast is just showing its true colours now)


Just really pointing out it can be a few areas that could give you those symptoms apart from Badcaps which over the last few years has proven to bet a good bet


yeah schematics for MB seem to be rare as.....your best bet is to locate the chip numbers and look for application docs, this may give you a hint as to how that section is put together


Others here would be better to advise on the best approach to how to go about trouble shooting it ...they do it everyday

Hope it of some help anyway

Cheers

[Brewster]

Re: VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

StarFury1-Thanks for your thourogh reply. I believe this board was part of a bulk buyout. I bought 2@20.00 ea. Boards "looked" great, have a ton of features, and the price was right.( Or so I thought). Then I started having BSOD's, freezes. random blank screens and so forth.Anyway I learned of the cap problem from Badcaps,researched, and recapped with Panny FM's. But now I feel like a dummy. Following your advice I checked everything but lastly replaced all 3 sticks of ram and wouldn't you know it seems to be behaving now. The sad thing is I do this kind of stuff everyday. (redface)I think Ijust got off on the wrong troubleshooting trail. Memtest,virus scan,all good. I'll let run tonight and see tomorrow. Thanks again. (hanging my head in shame)

[Brewster]

Re: VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

Hey all, Everything is working great.24hrs. now. I'm so embarassed

[Paul S]

Re: VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

I have a VIA P4PB400-FL that I need to re-cap. In fact, that is the board that lead me to this forum.

If this is the same board that you just recapped, could you list the brand of caps that you used? I also have a similar board, VIA P4PB-Ultra, that also needs recapping. This has different size caps, though.

Paul

[Brewster]

Re: VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

Hi Paul, Welcome aboard.
The caps I used were Panasonic Fm series electrolytics. I replaced everything 1000uF and above. I've been a Tech for years but this was my first recap. Just some advice, read the recap procedure by Willawake. It's excellent! I got my caps from Digikey. 40 of them. It took me forever, ( 6-8hrs ),but it was my first and I didn't want any mistakes.Was actually quite fun. I put together a $25.00 min order, but I actually have less than $20.00 in it. Goodluck, take your time and have fun.

[Paul S]

Re: VIA P4PB400 Recap Failure

Thanks.

I've been poking around these forums since late last year. I bought replacement boards for the two bad ones, so there was no hurry to fix them. The new boards supported better/faster cpu's, so I upgraded those also. So now I also have two cpu's to put in these boards, a P4 2.6ghz and a P4 2.8ghz.

That looks like the start of two pretty good systems. I have the Digikey catalog, and even bought a new soldering iron to do the job. Now I just have to find the time.

Thanks again

Paul