PCs Plagued by Bad Capacitors

Hawaiian Rules writes "CNET has a story detailing a new threat to Dell PCs, Apple iMacs and other computers with Intel boards. This has been documented on BadCaps.net for some time, but the article also discusses what to do if you suspect you've got a case of the bad caps."

Comments

If you don't wanna get ripped off.

[neologee]

Never buy brand new high-tech toys before they've actually passed major consumer testing.

It's the same for everything technological! Only through trial and error, consumer brute force sort of do they get the best product after 1-2 years for most products such as Dell's, i'd cite motor companies too but bah.

Re:If you don't wanna get ripped off.

[lbrandy]

Never buy brand new high-tech toys before they've actually passed major consumer testing.

It's the same for everything technological! Only through trial and error, consumer brute force sort of do they get the best product after 1-2 years for most products such as Dell's, i'd cite motor companies too but bah. Well, considering electrolytic caps were invented in the 30s, I'd think we've given them enough spin-up to get that newfangled technology under control. The problem here is just poor quality control and cost-cutting. Luckily in the free-market, this type of things tend be a short-lived trend... it just requires the spotlight.

Re:If you don't wanna get ripped off.

[Shanep]

I'd think if there was a market for a motherboard with yellow PCI slots and a purple PCB that this would be a much more attractive option.

It gets even more ridiculous than that. Remember that AOpen motherboard with the vacume tube amplified built-in sound card? Yeah, that's what I need! Bugger the high quality core components! I need extra harmonics! Warm sound!

This all comes down to marketting. Most people don't know what they need or should wan't, so what they want is dictated to them by the companies who have an interest is SALES. Put together some crap, say it's fine Belgian dark chocolate and people not only will buy it, but they'll rave about it in forums and even refer to it as part of their "kit" or "rig" in their signatures.

If it's consumer level, regardless of how much you paid for it, it is probably mutton dressed up as lamb.

Re:If you don't wanna get ripped off.

[CharlieG]

The BIG problem is that vendors often change the way components are made without telling you

Back in the early 80s, I worked for a defense contractor. One of the units we made used a FET (Field effect transistor) - a nice standard 2n number if I remember right. Well, one day, about every 3 or 4th unit we made failed ONE test, and all symptoms pointed at the FET - you'd change it, and sometimes it would go away - luckily, we saved the "BAD" FETs - it seems that ONE of the manufacturers had "Improved" their process for making the part. None of the parts made by them after a certain date worked in our design, and it turns out, they "tweaked" the spec based on our findings. Didn't HELP us, but we knew then to do what is known as a "lifetime buy" - aka buy ALL the parts of the old spec that we thought we would ever need - we figured we needed about 100 more - we bought 1000 to be safe (hey, at 10 cents each - better save than sorry)

So trust me, the cap maker can change things on someone like Dell (or IBM or whoever) and never even mention it to them. I'm quite sure that Dell will be talking to them about this problem

Nothin new here. Just like Car Makers.

[Vorondil28]

If a car maker can get away with a cheaper, flimsier [insert part here], save a few cents on each car, and sell millions of cars, they can make a mo'load more profit than if they'd gone with the slightly better quality part on every car. Same thing here only with mobos and capacitors -- nothing new.

After I knew what they looked like

[saskboy]

It was easy to spot obviously bad capacitors once I knew what they looked like. The ones I notice look like little cylinders on metal legs, with a rounded instead of flat metal top.

My least favourite kind of capacitor though, is one that works properly, but has been put in the worst place possible so that putting the heat sink on that is supposed to match the CPU, is impossible. And you can't exactly bend those suckers over out of the way, so you have to buy another heat sink that conforms to the annoying motherboard layout.

Re:WTF?

[chrispitude]

It's not claiming that capacitors maintain current. They help deal with current (ie - voltage) surges. Capacitors store charge, and current is the movement of charge. The capacitor provides a place for this charge to be temporarily absorbed relative to ground, lessening the immediate impact on voltage at that node. This is why capacitors are used to smooth out supply rails.