can anyone help with an electronics problemed computer?

[John Thomson]

Capacitors can and do leak Chris…………….looks like rust when they burst.

john

[Zoltan Guban]

If is on board graphic card try to plug a spare card [form another pc] in the agp or pci slot, if there is a card try the card in another pc and the other parts memory processor etc.

[Martin Pearson]

Chris, it’s hard to say for sure as there are loads of reasons for failures. You can replace them but you do need to be reasonably good at soldering and have a decent iron.
Problem is that they may have failed because of another fault on the board which you won’t know until you try. Price of motherboards for desktop machines you might be just as well replacing the board straight away to get it up and running quickly.

[Tim Painter]

Sounds like electrolytic capacitors Chris.

Maybe work at least a go changing them.
If you do try changing yourself note the voltage, Farad value and also the polarity as electrolytic capacitors are polorised.

Only problem changing the board if it’s older generation is having the same type memory, chip type, hard drive interface etc etc.

Maybe post a pic Chris.

[Tomas Vidziunas]

I would start taking parts away and replacing with working ones (just temporary for example from a other working pc)
It can be lots of things that could cause that. Take memory (RAM) away, graphics card, CPU.
Does it beeps when you power on? Does DVD drive powers on, does HDDs shows any signs of life (if you cant hear it try touching, to feel vibration).

[Chris Wool]

thanks everybody i am now quite sure that the MB caps are at fault and there is about 4 that are bulging tops, so trying to find a similar board.

cant help thinking that something else has blown the caps.

else it will be all new. but it only used to do the net and network drive some printers. no power required

chris

[Martin Pearson]

Chris, you probably already know this but if you take the motherboard number and search using that then you will probably have more luck as the same board will probably be in a range of different makes and models.

[Doug Woodrow]

quote Chris Wool:

can’t help thinking that something else has blown the caps.

Hi Chris, it’s most likely just a case of capacitor failure, this is quite a common problem often caused by a dodgy electrolyte used in low-ESR capacitors (as used in the power regulation circuit on motherboards). See also this tech-archive.net post.

I had a similar problem with a motherboard a couple of years ago, and it worked fine after recapping the board. However you need to be fairly competent with a soldering iron, and decent replacement capacitors will probably cost you more than a decent secondhand PC on an auction site, if you really don’t need any serious power.

[Simon Strom]

Yeah, depending on how the old the board is, it might be just as cheap to replace the whole MoBo than fix the capacitors. I found a few different AMD MoBos on eBay that would work with some AMD chips (AthlonXP 1900+ and 2100+) I had at my house. Clearly a risk buying on eBay, but both worked flawlessly. I got each for around $10 (about £5). I would just make sure that the seller has been around for a while with a high user rating.

Either figure out what board you have now and replace with the exact same, or find a board that supports the same specs your other hardware requires and that the board will fit into the case you have. The two boards I got had to have a very large tower as they were unusual AMD size (I think 7" x 11" or something like that). Anyway good luck. Hope you get up and running soon.

[Chris Wool]

thanks guys

at about the same time i built that one i built one for the daughter and that has now become free, so all being well it has the same board in it.
if so i will make one good one out of the two.
so might end up with a dual screen set up.

chris