How to avoid motherboard with bad caps? Go with Albatron?

[75475,451]

This may be old news to many of you.

In considering a new motherboard, I remembered an article I stumbled
upon a few days ago talking about bad capacitors in motherboards
manufactured in the last two years. I just Googled the topic and found
some scary information. I have built three computers since 2002. One
with a Tyan Trinity 510, and two others with socket A, KT266a and KT333a
chipset, MSI motherboards. One was for a guy I worked with last summer.
He says it still runs fine. Hope it continues to run fine.

Anyway, the impression I got from the articles and postings I read was
that even highly regarded motherboard manufacturers fell into this
problem of using faulty caps. I won't name any of them, I'll leave that
to Google. But I will name one that claims to have avoided the faulty
capacitor issue, by insuring that they used the best capacitors made in
Japan, Albatron. I would never have thought. I saw how cheap they where
while searching on Pricewatch (I never really heard of Albatron until
I searched Pricewatch), and automaticaly considered them a stability
risk. I may take another look at what they have to offer.

Also in my reading, Intel was not mentioned as a manufacturer that may
have used faulty capacitors.

Is this a non-issue with recent dual channel Pentium boards, and
Athlon64/FX boards?

Ed

 

[Al Dykes]

This may be old news to many of you.

In considering a new motherboard, I remembered an article I stumbled
upon a few days ago talking about bad capacitors in motherboards
manufactured in the last two years. I just Googled the topic and found
some scary information. I have built three computers since 2002. One
with a Tyan Trinity 510, and two others with socket A, KT266a and KT333a
chipset, MSI motherboards. One was for a guy I worked with last summer.
He says it still runs fine. Hope it continues to run fine.

Anyway, the impression I got from the articles and postings I read was
that even highly regarded motherboard manufacturers fell into this
problem of using faulty caps. I won't name any of them, I'll leave that
to Google. But I will name one that claims to have avoided the faulty
capacitor issue, by insuring that they used the best capacitors made in
Japan, Albatron. I would never have thought. I saw how cheap they where
while searching on Pricewatch (I never really heard of Albatron until
I searched Pricewatch), and automaticaly considered them a stability
risk. I may take another look at what they have to offer.

Also in my reading, Intel was not mentioned as a manufacturer that may
have used faulty capacitors.

Is this a non-issue with recent dual channel Pentium boards, and
Athlon64/FX boards?

Ed

ISTR it was one bad batch of parts from a company using materials they
may have known were bogus. One way or another, the mobo assembly lines
found a source of good parts quickly.

The inventory pipline from the parts manufacturers to the board
manufacturers, to the dealer is very lean these days. Nobody keeps
warehouses full of stuff anymore. The bad boards were flushed long
ago. The machines you built more than a year ago may be at risk, but I
wouldn't worry about capacitors in stuff you buy today. And remember,
only a percentage of the boards made with these capacitors acutually
fails.

Today's news is that the motherboards in some Dell servers sold last
fall may catch fire. It's not the last problem that bites, it's the
one you haven't found yet (or hasn't found you.)

 

[Gary Tait]

ISTR it was one bad batch of parts from a company using materials they
may have known were bogus. One way or another, the mobo assembly lines
found a source of good parts quickly.

The inventory pipline from the parts manufacturers to the board
manufacturers, to the dealer is very lean these days. Nobody keeps
warehouses full of stuff anymore. The bad boards were flushed long
ago. The machines you built more than a year ago may be at risk, but I
wouldn't worry about capacitors in stuff you buy today. And remember,
only a percentage of the boards made with these capacitors acutually
fails.

Today's news is that the motherboards in some Dell servers sold last
fall may catch fire. It's not the last problem that bites, it's the
one you haven't found yet (or hasn't found you.)

FWIW, I built my PC summer 2002, and have had no problems that could
be attributed to bad caps. It is based on an MSI KT3 ultra, with a
cheap no-name PSU, and a 4x4x24 CDRW drive, and numerous pre 1998
parts.

 

[Frank]

I think that this was an issue with some 440LX boards. A looooog
time ago, using PC time.

 

[Bogdan]

ISTR it was one bad batch of parts from a company using materials they
may have known were bogus. One way or another, the mobo assembly lines
found a source of good parts quickly.

The inventory pipline from the parts manufacturers to the board
manufacturers, to the dealer is very lean these days. Nobody keeps
warehouses full of stuff anymore.

As it happens, today we had a MB in an IBM server replaced the second
time around due to exploding capacitors (server is 1.5 yr old, 1st
replacement ~1 year ago). However, in this case, the problem was
probably that the first replacement motherboard itself might have been
one from the old batch as the original.
I agree that that batch of caps are very unlikely to be in a brand new
MBs.

 

[Ed]

This may be old news to many of you.

In considering a new motherboard, I remembered an article I stumbled
upon a few days ago talking about bad capacitors in motherboards
manufactured in the last two years. I just Googled the topic and found
some scary information. I have built three computers since 2002. One
with a Tyan Trinity 510, and two others with socket A, KT266a and KT333a
chipset, MSI motherboards. One was for a guy I worked with last summer.
He says it still runs fine. Hope it continues to run fine.

Anyway, the impression I got from the articles and postings I read was
that even highly regarded motherboard manufacturers fell into this
problem of using faulty caps. I won't name any of them, I'll leave that
to Google. But I will name one that claims to have avoided the faulty
capacitor issue, by insuring that they used the best capacitors made in
Japan, Albatron. I would never have thought. I saw how cheap they where
while searching on Pricewatch (I never really heard of Albatron until
I searched Pricewatch), and automaticaly considered them a stability
risk. I may take another look at what they have to offer.

Albatron are pretty new to the scene but the m/b's are very good, the people
behind the company are ex Gigabyte.

Eddy.

 

[Doug Warner]

As it happens, today we had a MB in an IBM server replaced the second
time around due to exploding capacitors (server is 1.5 yr old, 1st

I work for *** Intel server support. The bad caps are a big problem
in systems produced over the last 4 years or so, including some
introduced within the last couple years. Mostly, for some reason, the
lower-end servers, those that share MB's with workstation class
machines. The midrange and high end systems haven't received any of
these caps.

Servers are the most heavily impacted, since they're usually left on
24 x 7, so the hydrogen gas pressure continues to build until the
cap's seals blow. In home systems, generally left off until needed.
the hydrogen has time to leak away.

Here's a good article about the original of the problem:
http://www.niccomp.com/taiwanlowesr.htm



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[Dashi]

Mobo manufacturers quickly correct problems with their product, if not they
wouldn't be selling any.

Forget about the capicator issue, it's long gone.

Dashi