OMG how is this thing still stable?!?

[Sparky]

After my brother's problem with his Antec TP 380W I thought it would be a good idea to check my parents' PC that has an even older smartpower 350W in it. So I popped it open and.... OMG



That tall one 2nd from the left is disgusting. Never have I seen a cap that bad!

Now this is the strange thing - the system is totally, I mean perfectly stable! My brother's computer was having all sorts of trouble when his TP 380W had only one bulged and leaky cap. This thing has 3 leaky (one extremely so!) and one bulged (hard to tell in the pic, it's the top left one).

At any rate, I'm not taking more chances with it. Putting this Enhance 400W unit in there for now instead. Bought it for my brother's PC to replace his truepower but for some reason it won't work in there turns on for a nanosecond then back off. No idea why, the PSU works fine in every other system I try it in

Topcat will be getting another cap request soon Thanks to him my brother's truepower 380W is working again

[Rainbow]

Re: OMG how is this thing still stable?!?

There is also a glue on the caps - so not everything on top of them came from inside.

[Sparky]

Re: OMG how is this thing still stable?!?

I scraped off the stuff on top of that tall cap, it was all cap innards. The cap above it is fine and just has glue.

[999999999]

Re: OMG how is this thing still stable?!?

It's all about time. A cap can vent and is still viable for awhile, but it is quickly drying out once vented. With low current, it could run quite a while like that, and a lot of capacitance (relative to current) on the motherboard or other connected parts will also *buffer that ripple. Only when it becomes bad enough that the downstream caps can't buffer, will it cause instability (unless the caps shorts out).

In other words, once PSU caps fail the capacitors on the powered parts become a part of the PSU subcircuit to a significant extent, and this can wear them out faster. It is good you caught this failure ahead of time, it is an ideal situation to have leisure in repair instead of manditory, immediate system downtime.