For the last year and a half I've been running this system:
Epox 8RDA+ Rev 1.0
Athlon XP 2500+ Barton
PNY Geforce 4 Ti 4600
2x 512MB Corsair XMS PC3200
Antec SL400 PSU
The first month or so, I spent overclocking and hitting my proverbial wall, which was 200x11, with 2-3-3-7 timings.
Six months ago, I ordered a Gainward Geforce FX 5950 ultra to upgrade, and I installed it. When I was installing it I noticed a black residue on the top part of the ATX connector in the motherboard inside of the plugs. I honestly didn't know what to make of it so I kind of ignored it.
I installed the FX 5950 and had no problems for a few days. Then I started having graphic glitches when starting windows, I would get all funky pixels and colorings when at the Win2k loading screen. I switched back to the Ti 4600 and I had the same problem.
After a few days of troubleshooting, I just went out and bought an Antec True430 and that seemed to fix the problems. I used the FX 5950 for a week or so. Then I started freezing while playing games forcing a cold boot, getting jittering noises in my speakers when it froze. I switched to the Ti 4600, and the problem disappeared. I RMA'd the FX 5950, and I've been using my computer the last 5 1/2 months without a hitch.
Last week, I switched my desks, I powered off the computer, didn't unplug the power cable from the back of the box, placed the monitor on the floor, switched desks, and put the monitor back on the floor. When I booted up, I got "inaccessible boot device" errors, sometimes the windows 2k loading screen would freeze, or windows would freeze while loading up.
After trying to check for loose connectors and plugs, I narrowed it down that I couldn't run with my overclocked settings anymore and prime95 had become unstable, when it had ran perfect over a year ago with the overclocked settings. After doing more researching, I found out about the potential bad caps problem, and, you guessed it, I checked the caps and some near the CPU were bulging, and there was a tiny bit of an orange residue/substance on the top of 2 of them.
Over the weekend, I've had the computer off in fear of it affecting any of the others parts, and because of this, I went ahead and just ordered an Abit NF7-S rev 2.0, which should be here tomorrow. During all this commotion, my FX 5950, which I RMA'd 2 months ago, just now arrived at my doorstep, a brand new one from Gainward.
So, tomorrow when the new board comes, I'll be rebuilding my computer with the new board and hopefully finally being able to test out the new video card.
There are some things making me nervous right now about the inevitable rebuilding of my computer.
Could any of the other pieces of the computer have been affected by the bad caps problem?
Was the black residue on the ATX connector from a bad PSU, or from the bad caps deteriorating?
Could this have also caused the instability with the FX 5950?
Am I heading toward any possible problems tomorrow with the processor, video card or the PSU?
This is the first time this has happened to me, and I don't know what to expect.
Epox 8RDA+ Rev 1.0
Athlon XP 2500+ Barton
PNY Geforce 4 Ti 4600
2x 512MB Corsair XMS PC3200
Antec SL400 PSU
The first month or so, I spent overclocking and hitting my proverbial wall, which was 200x11, with 2-3-3-7 timings.
Six months ago, I ordered a Gainward Geforce FX 5950 ultra to upgrade, and I installed it. When I was installing it I noticed a black residue on the top part of the ATX connector in the motherboard inside of the plugs. I honestly didn't know what to make of it so I kind of ignored it.
I installed the FX 5950 and had no problems for a few days. Then I started having graphic glitches when starting windows, I would get all funky pixels and colorings when at the Win2k loading screen. I switched back to the Ti 4600 and I had the same problem.
After a few days of troubleshooting, I just went out and bought an Antec True430 and that seemed to fix the problems. I used the FX 5950 for a week or so. Then I started freezing while playing games forcing a cold boot, getting jittering noises in my speakers when it froze. I switched to the Ti 4600, and the problem disappeared. I RMA'd the FX 5950, and I've been using my computer the last 5 1/2 months without a hitch.
Last week, I switched my desks, I powered off the computer, didn't unplug the power cable from the back of the box, placed the monitor on the floor, switched desks, and put the monitor back on the floor. When I booted up, I got "inaccessible boot device" errors, sometimes the windows 2k loading screen would freeze, or windows would freeze while loading up.
After trying to check for loose connectors and plugs, I narrowed it down that I couldn't run with my overclocked settings anymore and prime95 had become unstable, when it had ran perfect over a year ago with the overclocked settings. After doing more researching, I found out about the potential bad caps problem, and, you guessed it, I checked the caps and some near the CPU were bulging, and there was a tiny bit of an orange residue/substance on the top of 2 of them.
Over the weekend, I've had the computer off in fear of it affecting any of the others parts, and because of this, I went ahead and just ordered an Abit NF7-S rev 2.0, which should be here tomorrow. During all this commotion, my FX 5950, which I RMA'd 2 months ago, just now arrived at my doorstep, a brand new one from Gainward.
So, tomorrow when the new board comes, I'll be rebuilding my computer with the new board and hopefully finally being able to test out the new video card.
There are some things making me nervous right now about the inevitable rebuilding of my computer.
Could any of the other pieces of the computer have been affected by the bad caps problem?
Was the black residue on the ATX connector from a bad PSU, or from the bad caps deteriorating?
Could this have also caused the instability with the FX 5950?
Am I heading toward any possible problems tomorrow with the processor, video card or the PSU?
This is the first time this has happened to me, and I don't know what to expect.
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