My first motherboard recap, HP Skyhawk D325

[bad_the_ba]

Thanks for all the help these forums have been in my first venture at recapping a motherboard. I have recapped various routers and a few other things, but last night I attempted my first motherboard repair. It was for a customer of mine who is also my tax preparer, and her home office computer, an HP d325 with dual on board VGA ports, had died during her busy season. Through research on the forums here I decided it was something I could tackle, and since it wasn't booting at all (fans spin up, no system beeps unless memory was removed completely, no video output), I figured it couldn't hurt anything. I also located 2 identical motherboards on eBay, which by the pictures looked like they also had damaged capacitors in the same locations as the one I planned on repairing. After asking questions of the seller, they pulled the listings and sold them to me at half their original asking price with no warranty or return options ($25/ea, $331 new from HP). They are supposedly working boards, but based on condition, I know I need to recap them and test them before I do anything else with them. Since my customer's board is working fine and booted right away after my repair, I don't think I will need these as backup or spare parts.
Now to the question... One of the boards (board number 1) I received had been recapped already with Ruby 2200uF MBZs and Ruby 1000uF YXGs, which are the same as what I used to perform my repair. However, almost all of the Ruby's on the eBay boards are bubbled or have blown seals on the bottoms. Board number 1 also has some Sanyo (not original) caps in other positions that look alright. Board number 2 has mostly original caps, with a few of the smaller ones looking like they were replaced. All the original 2200uF KZGs on board number 2 are bubbled or have blown seals. These boards were guaranteed to boot, but I will first recap them; and as I don't have a correct CPU heatsink yet, I will not be testing them for several days. What I am wondering is if I should be questioning my own repair or choice of replacement capacitors, since the eBay board with the same Ruby's is in pretty bad shape, or if it's possible that it was just a poor job done before I received it. The board I repaired booted perfectly the first time, and has passed all my tests, and I am happy with all the solder joints, but just wondering what might cause the MBZ 2200uF replacements to fail on the eBay board. Only time will tell on my repair, but it is back in service as of today at her home office. Thanks for any input
Oh, and an unrelated question. I have a Soyo P4 board with all junk OST caps I am ordering replacements for. Right now, it boots and runs fine, but the onboard NIC will constantly go back and forth from connected to disconnected and back again rather rapidly. I plan on putting in an add-in card, but was wondering if this could be a symptom of a bad cap as well. (Drivers and everything else are up to date, cables and router/switch test fine with other equipment, lights on onboard NIC show always connected at 100Mbps, same symptoms under any OS)

[PCBONEZ]

Re: My first motherboard recap, HP Skyhawk D325

Welcome to BCN.

WOW! - Questions in bite sized chunks are easier to answer.

It's not uncommon for manufacturers to switch caps during production over availability issues. So: all boards with the same model number won't necessarily have the same caps from the factory and some of your original vs not original assumptions my be incorrect. (Mind you I can't see the boards.)

Boards in poorly ventilated cases or attached to a bad PSU can blow ANY kind of cap.

KZG have known heat issues.

Soyo probably has a load of smaller GSC-Sacon-Evercon (all same brand) scattered.
Those are junk but small ones don't -usually- cause problems.
If you have a bunch near the LAN chip or port you might try replacing them.

You might want to inspect the power supply in her HP but other than that you are probably okay.

.

[bad_the_ba]

Re: My first motherboard recap, HP Skyhawk D325

Thanks for the input, I think you are right that the one I repaired should be alright, I had her move it off the carpet and more out in the open. I am pretty confident that the power supply is fine. I will take a few pics of the bad boards that I have yet to repair, just in case I need pics later. Sorry about cramming so much into one post.
Cheers!