"100% Japanese Capacitors"

[mousiness]

In most DFI motherboards there are comments about the main specs of their motherboard site, and on most of their features it says "100% japanese capacitors", does this have any specific meaning why they put 100% JAPANESE capacitors? Are they better or different in any way?

[Kougar]

I would assume they say that to show they're using good quality caps, but I couldn't say whether it was true or not.

A good read on the subject matter... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague) The most recent of which having been a series of Dell Dimension desktop motherboards that had cheap quality capacitors used on them. I noticed a friend's system was one of those when helping with his video card, thankfully he had a month left on his standard warranty and got a new system out of it.

Heat is also another thing that will cause caps to go bad prematurely. It's not uncommon for the caps in the line of fire from hot video card exhaust to develop these problems.

[mousiness]

thats cool, i always knew there were good quality capacitors just never knew that they much THAT much of a difference.

[Bio-Hazard]

There was a big problem with cheap capacitors a while back, it was a problem whith most MoBo makers. They were using cheap ones from somewhere, Taiwanese I think, and they started leaking after a fairly short period of time and killing boards.

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=195

Taiwanese Capacitors Leaking, Exploding



Posted by Hemos (http://everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=322) on Mon Nov 04, '02 02:02 PM
from the ka-BLAM dept.
http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topichardware.gif (http://hardware.slashdot.org/search.pl?tid=137)
ackthpt writes "A few astute slashdot readers were on to something back when this article (http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/09/29/1613214&tid=4) was published. After a tip (http://www.e-insite.net/index.asp?layout=article&articleId=CA255062&title=Search+Results&publication=e-insite&webzine=e-insite) (at e-insight.net (http://www.e-insite.net/)) on failing caps (http://www.amdmb.com/#News-5171) over at amdmb (http://www.amdmb.com/) I did a little looking around and found this article (http://www.ttiinc.com/MarketEye/zogbi_on_passives_20021014.asp) by Dennis Zogbi on TTI Inc.'s site (http://www.ttiinc.com/), which goes into more detail. In a nutshell, many motherboards are now failing due to electolytic capacitors made with an inferior water-based electolyte. Within days or a few months these capacitors build up hydrogen gas and blow the rubber bung out the end of the capacitor, leaking electolyte and causing havoc. The problem may be widespread, as many consumer electronics made with these capacitors may also fail prematurely. Gary Headlee (http://home.att.net/~garyheadlee/index.html) specializes in Abit motherboards, but as his FAQ states, he will work on other makes and the FAQ has more info on capacitor problems."

http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/11/04/1751210&mode=thread

Google this "motherboard capacitor leaking" and you'll get pages of articles on the subject.

[Miles]

You haven't lived until you think it's the 4th of July and it's really March. March two years ago I had a cap blown in an Asus P4C800-E Revision 1 board. I looked and unfortunately sounded like a firecracker popping and then a small amount of smoke came out of the case.

I went into emergency mode and pulled the cord. The long and short of it, nothing but the board suffered any ill and I got a brand new revision 2 board after several heated discussions with Asus in California's technical personnel. I had to move up the chain to get someone that would acknowledge they had a problem with caps at the time and finally to his boss. Nuff said it's not much fun to experience.

I'm really wondering and have written articles about it before why no company seems to have an enthusiast line of motherboards and other cards that use only the best components. I figured at the most it might add $25 to $30 to the cost of the component and who would mind that if it gave them the peace of mind that they had solid components on board. Instead products, even server boards have components with, how shall I say, programmed obsolesence, be it a cap explosion like I had or simply a part that fails 30 days after the warranty ends.:rolleyes:

[Gray]

Union Made! :)

No they are REALLY Important that they are good. As an electronics student I have tested a few and some are absolutly redicoullous. I am capable of making much more accurate myself!

Just a hint..... Definition of a Capacitor is "2 conductors seperated by an insulator" would that not be a snipped piece of normal lamp cord or stereo wire? It is...

They are easy to make, I can't believe tht some one would go "cheap" on them lmao. But someone allways will.

[Schwarz]

I did study electronics myself.
Its actually really fun to blow them up !
Most people think a cap. leaks or burn but never explode.
Boy you guys should see some of them just BANG explode and jump in your face.
Well of course we plugged them on a powersuply and boosted the voltage to something ridiculous but still !

[liqnit]

I did study electronics myself.
Its actually really fun to blow them up !
Most people think a cap. leaks or burn but never explode.
Boy you guys should see some of them just BANG explode and jump in your face.
Well of course we plugged them on a powersuply and boosted the voltage to something ridiculous but still !
sounds like lots of fun
can you post some pics of it :)

[Coolest-Tech]

I rember my father was tring to fix a battery lawn mower, sordered the cap backwards, and it exploded in like 5 seconds. Was quite fun. :)

[mousiness]

Thats HILARIOUS, i heard from my dad that his friend from work had saudered the cap the wrong way and had exploded and caused a fire and destroyed part of the MoBo, so in the end his friend decided hed take his pc fix-ups to the technician there... like people say if you cant fix it get a pro to do it for you, actually my friends dads technician hap saudered in a mod chip into his xbox and has modded my ps2.