Dell optiplex 960

[Jackching]

Has anyone repaired one of these boards? Lights 1 and 2 come on with the power supply testing good. 1 and 2 show bad motherboard in the manual. I pulled one polymer cap so far that tested bad but didn't replace it yet because I didn't have a replacement. So I'm just wondering if there are any known caps that go bad on this board before I order.

[momaka]

Re: Dell optiplex 960

I see mostly Rubycon and Panasonic caps around the board, so those should be OK.
However, I do also see two green Sanyo/Suncon caps. If they are WF series, you might want to replace them. WG = okay.

That aside, how did you conclude the one cap you pulled is bad? Measure in circuit? With what device? Do you have a cap tester or just a multimeter? If only multimeter, then you can't really test caps with it and likely you just measured the resistance of the CPU, as that's what those caps filter.

Also, make sure when you test the board that you have a heasink on the CPU. CPU with no heatsink can thrown an error.

And last but not least, try a different stick of RAM. Try it in both RAM slots too.

If you have no history of how this motherboard was used or if someone might have worked on it before you, then remove the CPU and inspect pins in the CPU socket. Removing and re-installing the CPU should also clear any possible corrosion on the CPU pads (typically only applies to very humid environments, but still I recommend doing it.)