What Is The Lifespan Of Motherboards?

[SanDiegoFunkDaddy]

I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this thing
eventually die like a hard drive?

 

[Ken Fox]

I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this thing
eventually die like a hard drive?

Hard to say. For me, they all die premature deaths after multiple and
unending upgrades, I finally succeed in frying it somehow and someway.
Occasionally I think I do this subconsciously, when I really want a new
system but can't justify the expenditure.

ken

 

[Rob Stow]

I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this thing
eventually die like a hard drive?

Take good care of it and you shouldn't have any problem making
it last a decade. Charities, churches, schools, etc are chock
full of ten year systems that keep on chugging away.

For most people the motherboard seldom dies before it is discarded.
The useful life is usually determined by the ability of the
motherboard to keep up with newer processors, video cards, RAM,
etc - when it can't do that, out it goes.

FWIW, I recently moved from a house to an apartment and had to
give up a couple of old systems I no longer had room for. One
was a 13 year old AMD 386 system and one was a 7 or 8 year
old 75 MHz Pentium. Both had been running 24/7 on things like
SETI and folding@home simply because I was curious about how
long they would last. Fortunately the guy I gave them to wanted
to continue the experiment and they are still humming along.
I had to replace fans and hard drives once in a while, and also
a PSU for the P75 system, but the motherboard and CPU outlasted
father time.

 

[Paul]

I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this thing
eventually die like a hard drive?

A lot of electronic parts can last a long time. On the motherboard, there
are a few parts that are under stress, or have lifespans that are known to
be limited.

As far as I know, electrolytic capacitors have around a 10 year lifespan.
Lifetime is dependent on their operating temperature, so a poorly
ventilated PC case won't help matters. Operating the computer in
an air conditioned room will help here.

Another area of concern is solder joint reliability. Specifically
under the large chips. Solder joints and power device junctions
are stressed every time electronics heat up after being switched
on. This kind of wearout mechanism depends on the delta_T (from
lowest temp, which is room temp while unpowered, to highest
temp, after the equipment has been running for a while).
Some of the Northbridge and Southbridge chips have high enough
ball counts on the bottom, to have reliable connections for
less than ten years. So, there is a small chance one of the
connections between a chipset chip and the motherboard will fail.

Lastly, in the case of the P4 motherboards that are stressed
by the compression around the P4 socket, there will be an effect
on the solder joints as well. I haven't read any reports on how
much stress can be applied, because in the stuff I've worked on,
I would never be allowed to apply stress like that used for some
P4 socket/HSF installations.

Having a well ventilated PC case that is constantly powered up,
should give the longest operating life. Switching the computer
off every day, or even running it in some kind of low power mode
at night (causing the computer to cool off), will drive the
delta_T wearout (mechanical fatigure) processes.

If you plan on operating the computer forever, then buy a few spare
power supplies, because they are an unreliable part of your computer.
And, of course, when they fail, they can damage the motherboard
by applying inappropriate voltages.

Good ball bearing fans have a service life of 3 years, so they
should be replaced before they fail. Obviously, disk drives are like
light bulbs, and a large stack of them should be stored next
to the computer

HTH,
Paul

 

[simon]

I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this thing
eventually die like a hard drive?

The mobo will of course die eventually that is inevitable.

It could blow up spectacularly and burn your house down tommorow (I might
add that in the 20 or so years i have been playing with computers I have
only ever seen 2 blow up in smoke and no houses were damaged).

It may however, last until you or some relative you gave it to because they
weren't interested in games but think they may try this new fangled e-mail
thingy, finally throw it away because it is far too slow and out of date to
run the latest copy of Windows. If computers keep getting faster as "Moores
Law" suggests then it probably will not survive the upgrade to Longhorn (if
it is ever released that is).

My mother has a working 386SX-20 from 1989, I think she bought it. It has a
40MB HDD and 4MB of RAM. She's even got a working tandy 1000. It was a 8088
which was an 8bit version of the processor. It had an exciting 256KB of Ram
i think and no HDD at all. I've got kicking around somewhere a BBC Micro &
Master, a ZX81, an ORIC-32. I Still use a BX2000 bought in 1998 or 99 as my
COM server. (Get the point )

Just one important tip to keep it going. DONT OVERCLOCK IT. Overclock your
computer even 1 increased dramatically the chances of catastrophic failure.

 

[Tim]

I threw out a 8085 system with 64K Ram, CP/M, 5MB Disc Drive, dumb screen
the other day - not enough room. It still went.

It was the bees knees in 1982 went I purchased it $AUD5020 with fast matrix
head printer. Only ever 1 minor fault: a resister of the wrong value on the
floppy drive (5").

It was fast too! Multi user.......

- Tim

 

[Cybrow]

I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this thing
eventually die like a hard drive?

The cmos battery might die but it's cheap and easy to replace.
Motherboards do fail, usually leaking caps, but I work on systems
with older boards than yours that still function fine.

 

[Ben Pope]

I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this thing
eventually die like a hard drive?

Depends... if none of the components are defective (Should be picked up in
QC, but some may slip) or under rated for their purpose (Re: wrongly badged
caps in Taiwan a few years ago affecting Abit BE6-II, BP6 and more
manufacturers of boards of that era) then it should last "forever" if
treated well.

Motherboards don;t have any moving parts to wear out. The biggest problem
over time is thermal cycling, which is why cooling is important. But to be
fair, most motherboards (99.9%) which last the first couple of weeks will
probably outlive their useful life unless mistreated. I would say 10 years
is quite achievable for most boards, if not more.

Hard drives have moving parts, are therefore prone to wear and will fail in
time.

Ben

 

[Richard]

probably outlive their useful life unless mistreated. I would say 10 years
is quite achievable for most boards, if not more.

quite easily indeed. I've bought myself an Asus mobo for a P1/166 proc
some 10 yrs ago and the thing is still running as a Windows NT server..
hasn't failed a day.

Hard drives have moving parts, are therefore prone to wear and will fail in
time.

this same machine has its original harddrive I've bought in '93 .. also
still running. I'm not saving any important data on it anymore though!
..

Richard

 

[Leythos]

I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this thing
eventually die like a hard drive?

I have an ABIT BP6 that's more than 6 years old and it's still running
Dual Celeron 500's with Windows 2000 and MS SQL Server 2000 all the
time.

I have a 1976 Commodore PET 2001 that still runs.

I have an IBM PC (4mhz) that still runs (as does the 10MB hard drive).

I had a PC-AT (12Mhz) that ran when I threw it out in the trash....

Some systems run for years, others die, when it's time it's time.

 

[dgk]

I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this thing
eventually die like a hard drive?

I wrote a Voice Information System around 9-10 years ago. VB3 Win31.
On a 20mhz board with, I think, a 240mb drive. Dialogic card, full
length. It has run 24/7 since then. Still runs. No surge protector
either. I can't believe it. Same drive. Same everything. They really
should consider upgrading.

 

[Ben Pope]

this same machine has its original harddrive I've bought in '93 .. also
still running. I'm not saving any important data on it anymore though!
..

Probably a good idea

Does emphasise the point that powering hard drives up and down is one of the
biggest factors in wearing them out. Presumably your disk rarely powers
down?

Ben

 

[Tim Draper]

i think my dad got that board. still going strong for him. i dont know
details of the mobo, but the only thing i can think of is the RIMM memory
capability. RIMM is expensive and has fallen in the path of the favoured
168pin DIMM's. RIMM still available tho.

like other posts say, dont overclock, dont fiddle and it should be strong
for a long time.a fair few of true overclockers will replace their system
entirely (with maybe the exception of case, PSU and possibly SFX card) so
making hardware last more than 12months isnt a concern. O/Cer's will also
most probably upgrade something/add something every 1-2months.

tim

 

[Tim]

The lifespan can be very short if the PSU blows up.
So, always keep an eye on dust and temps - particularly in PSU's.

- Tim

 

[Barry Watzman]

Oh, you didn't, I hope!! Those are antiques and they can be worth
staggering amounts of money. There are two on E-Bay right now and both
are over $1,000.00, and at that, neither has met the reserve!

 

[Tim]

Bugger!

It had a cobol compiler, Lisp, Wordstar, and I think an early version of
dbase on it. Predated IBM PC....

arghhhhhhhhhhh. I'll keep an eye out - there are still some around.

Thanks.

- Tim

 

[P2B]

A lot of electronic parts can last a long time. On the motherboard, there
are a few parts that are under stress, or have lifespans that are known to
be limited.

As far as I know, electrolytic capacitors have around a 10 year lifespan.
Lifetime is dependent on their operating temperature, so a poorly
ventilated PC case won't help matters. Operating the computer in
an air conditioned room will help here.

Another area of concern is solder joint reliability. Specifically
under the large chips. Solder joints and power device junctions
are stressed every time electronics heat up after being switched
on. This kind of wearout mechanism depends on the delta_T (from
lowest temp, which is room temp while unpowered, to highest
temp, after the equipment has been running for a while).
Some of the Northbridge and Southbridge chips have high enough
ball counts on the bottom, to have reliable connections for
less than ten years. So, there is a small chance one of the
connections between a chipset chip and the motherboard will fail.

Lastly, in the case of the P4 motherboards that are stressed
by the compression around the P4 socket, there will be an effect
on the solder joints as well. I haven't read any reports on how
much stress can be applied, because in the stuff I've worked on,
I would never be allowed to apply stress like that used for some
P4 socket/HSF installations.

Having a well ventilated PC case that is constantly powered up,
should give the longest operating life. Switching the computer
off every day, or even running it in some kind of low power mode
at night (causing the computer to cool off), will drive the
delta_T wearout (mechanical fatigure) processes.

If you plan on operating the computer forever, then buy a few spare
power supplies, because they are an unreliable part of your computer.
And, of course, when they fail, they can damage the motherboard
by applying inappropriate voltages.

Good ball bearing fans have a service life of 3 years, so they
should be replaced before they fail. Obviously, disk drives are like
light bulbs, and a large stack of them should be stored next
to the computer

HTH,
Paul

I tend leave my systems powered up 7 x 24 and run my motherboards
indefinitely - the newest I have is 4 years old, the oldest 12 - and I
have never had an Asus motherboard fail while in service.

I have repaired numerous P2B series boards that came to me dead, and in
most cases I would attribute the failure to external causes - they
stopped working after a power supply failure or during a thunderstorm
etc., and frequently have visible signs of overvoltage damage. I give up
on a significant percentage of the dead boards I receive because the
problem appears to be with one of the BGA chips, and I can't swap those
with the equipment I have - but these often failed after the original
owner swapped PCI cards with ATX standby power applied so may also be
externally caused.

I believe in preventative maintenance. I blow out the dust bunnies and
lubricate the fans at least annually, and have rarely had to replace a
fan. The only hard drive failure I have experienced in the last ten
years was a Fujitsu subject to recall, so I have accelerated my backup
schedule as I must be past due for a disaster

It will be interesting to see how much longer the P2B-S system at the
cottage lasts since it is overclocked to 150Mhz FSB and regularly
subjected to temperature extremes. We heat the place with a woodstove on
weekends and turn off the power when we are away during the week, so the
inside temperature typically cycles from -25C to +25C on a weekly basis
at this time of year. The system has survived 3 winters without a
hardware failure so far...

I tend to agree that thermal stress is probably the root cause of many
failures in electronic equipment, but after 15 years of weekly visits to
the cottage in winter, I really don't have any evidence to back that up.

P2B

 

[Rockin Ronnie]

The lifespan can be very short if the PSU blows up.
So, always keep an eye on dust and temps - particularly in PSU's.

- Tim

I am responding to this NG using a computer I bought in 1997. MB is a QDI
Legend I with Slot 1 PII-233. I have run it 24/7 almost continually since
then. My original 3.2 gig Maxtor is still running in another machine though
I am using a WD Expert 9.1 gig in this machine which is a little newer. For
simple web browsing and word processing, what else do you need? Those of us
with older machines tend to run them 24/7 and avoid life-shortening
powerups.

BTW, have a P4 2gig with an Asus P4T-E (Jan 2002) on my LAN just to let you
know that I am not that ancient.

I still have a Tandy Color Computer 128 that still runs though it is better
as a door stop!

Ron

 

[Kyle Brant]

Isn't anyone gonna bring up the Osborne, the first truly portable
computer? Ha, I recall seeing one years ago, it used STD bus cards.
BTW, do ya think my original Coleco game console is a collectors item
now? I still have the "ladybug" game cartridge, and the system still
works (circa 1982). FWIW, I designed numerous systems using 8080 and
8085 processor based systems for manufacturing test and automation use
back in the early 80's, it was a fun time for engineering, with
eye-popping 1 MHz CPUs, hehe.

--
Best regards,
Kyle
| Bugger!
|
| It had a cobol compiler, Lisp, Wordstar, and I think an early
version of
| dbase on it. Predated IBM PC....
|
| arghhhhhhhhhhh. I'll keep an eye out - there are still some around.
|
| Thanks.
|
| - Tim
|
|
|
| | > Oh, you didn't, I hope!! Those are antiques and they can be worth
| > staggering amounts of money. There are two on E-Bay right now and
both
| > are over $1,000.00, and at that, neither has met the reserve!
| >
| >
| >
| > Tim wrote:
| > > I threw out a 8085 system with 64K Ram, CP/M, 5MB Disc Drive,
dumb
| screen
| > > the other day - not enough room. It still went.
| > >
| > > It was the bees knees in 1982 went I purchased it $AUD5020 with
fast
| matrix
| > > head printer. Only ever 1 minor fault: a resister of the wrong
value on
| the
| > > floppy drive (5").
| > >
| > > It was fast too! Multi user.......
| > >
| > > - Tim
| > >
| > >
| > >
| > >
| > > | > >
| > >>SanDiegoFunkDaddy wrote:
| > >>
| > >>
| > >>>I've this P4T for 4 years ans its still going strong. Will this
thing
| > >>>eventually die like a hard drive?
| > >>>
| > >>
| > >>Take good care of it and you shouldn't have any problem making
| > >>it last a decade. Charities, churches, schools, etc are chock
| > >>full of ten year systems that keep on chugging away.
| > >>
| > >>For most people the motherboard seldom dies before it is
discarded.
| > >>The useful life is usually determined by the ability of the
| > >>motherboard to keep up with newer processors, video cards, RAM,
| > >>etc - when it can't do that, out it goes.
| > >>
| > >>FWIW, I recently moved from a house to an apartment and had to
| > >>give up a couple of old systems I no longer had room for. One
| > >>was a 13 year old AMD 386 system and one was a 7 or 8 year
| > >>old 75 MHz Pentium. Both had been running 24/7 on things like
| > >>SETI and folding@home simply because I was curious about how
| > >>long they would last. Fortunately the guy I gave them to wanted
| > >>to continue the experiment and they are still humming along.
| > >>I had to replace fans and hard drives once in a while, and also
| > >>a PSU for the P75 system, but the motherboard and CPU outlasted
| > >>father time.
| > >
| > >
| > >
| >
|
|

 

[Leythos]

Isn't anyone gonna bring up the Osborne, the first truly portable
computer? Ha, I recall seeing one years ago, it used STD bus cards.
BTW, do ya think my original Coleco game console is a collectors item
now? I still have the "ladybug" game cartridge, and the system still
works (circa 1982). FWIW, I designed numerous systems using 8080 and
8085 processor based systems for manufacturing test and automation use
back in the early 80's, it was a fun time for engineering, with
eye-popping 1 MHz CPUs, hehe.

The Osborne was a late comer, the 3B1 and 2B1 were out before that and
were 4 times the computer (Unix based) for the same price. The word
"portable" does not belong in the same sentence with Osborne, more like
Luggable