There are several different types of capacitor mounting configurations and also capacitor types. The most common type for motherboard applications is radial lead/radial wire ended.
Aluminium Electrolytic Capacitors - Radial Lead
An example : Panasonic FC capacitors which are radial lead. This means that they have two leads + and - coming out of the capacitor on the same end. The negative lead is the shorter one and also indicated by the stripe down the side of the capacitor which also shows a - symbol, repeated along the length of the capacitor. The photo shows capacitors as you would receive them new with the full length of leads that you can cut to size. These capacitors are Aluminium Electrolytic which means that there is probably two layers of aluminium foil which are separated by paper that is impregrated with an electrolyte gel. The layers are then wound and enclosed in an aluminium or plastic tube. You can clearly see in the photo the capacitor bungs at the bottom of the capacitor. On good capacitors like the Panasonic FC they are made of EPT (Ethylene Propylene Rubber) which is a synthetic material. On the bad capacitors for cost reasons, natural rubber is used. This gets hard with age and the failure of the electrolyte can bust the bung out of the bottom of the cheap caps, leaking electrolyte on your nice smd components.
Axial Lead
This means that one lead is at each end of the capacitor.
Surface Mount Chip Type Capacitors
Surface mount chip capacitors on an Asus video card. See their black surface mount seats which are at the bottom of each cap. The black mark on the silver top of the cap indicates the negative lead. The seat is also square at the negative side. It is not clearly apparent from the markings, who manufactured these caps. Why would they use these surface mount chip capacitors instead of normal radial lead capacitors? Well it is easier to place and solder them to the board with machines.
Aluminium Electrolytic Capacitors - Radial Lead
An example : Panasonic FC capacitors which are radial lead. This means that they have two leads + and - coming out of the capacitor on the same end. The negative lead is the shorter one and also indicated by the stripe down the side of the capacitor which also shows a - symbol, repeated along the length of the capacitor. The photo shows capacitors as you would receive them new with the full length of leads that you can cut to size. These capacitors are Aluminium Electrolytic which means that there is probably two layers of aluminium foil which are separated by paper that is impregrated with an electrolyte gel. The layers are then wound and enclosed in an aluminium or plastic tube. You can clearly see in the photo the capacitor bungs at the bottom of the capacitor. On good capacitors like the Panasonic FC they are made of EPT (Ethylene Propylene Rubber) which is a synthetic material. On the bad capacitors for cost reasons, natural rubber is used. This gets hard with age and the failure of the electrolyte can bust the bung out of the bottom of the cheap caps, leaking electrolyte on your nice smd components.
Axial Lead
This means that one lead is at each end of the capacitor.
Surface Mount Chip Type Capacitors
Surface mount chip capacitors on an Asus video card. See their black surface mount seats which are at the bottom of each cap. The black mark on the silver top of the cap indicates the negative lead. The seat is also square at the negative side. It is not clearly apparent from the markings, who manufactured these caps. Why would they use these surface mount chip capacitors instead of normal radial lead capacitors? Well it is easier to place and solder them to the board with machines.
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