Build Your Own Arcade Controls Forum
Main => Monitor/Video Forum => Topic started by: hypernova on July 05, 2013, 09:15:16 pm
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I've got an ATI 9600 PRO video card in my machine. Looks like it's got two blown capacitors, both the same rating. They're probably about 3/8" or so diameter, 1/2" tall. Look to be made of aluminum. Printed is:
FZ54I
1500
6.3V
Obviously it is 6.3 volts. I'm guessing the 1500 is the capacitance? I've done a search on the first line, but it yields nothing.
My question is, can I just get any capacitor that meets the voltage and capacitance specs (and aluminum)? Am I looking for something in particular? I'd rather see if I can fix this and learn a little at the same time. I've never replaced a capacitor before, and figured an older computer setup would be a good practice board, so if I blow something, it won't be very costly, as the rest of the PC parts are fairly old and easily replaced cheaply. Besides, they may be close to their death anyway.
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I'll give you some tips from MY experience replacing caps on motherboards and video cards. I'm proud to say i have saved quite a few electronic devices from an early grave by just recapping. Yes you can simply replace the caps with one of the same rating. Just make sure you are using a good, reputable capacitor brand. You can use a capacitor with a slightly higher voltage tolerance but you cannot swap one out for one with a larger microfarad rating. I'd suggest getting a set with both the same voltage and rating to be safe.
I would recommend Japanese Nichicon, Rubicon or Sanyo capacitors. Chinese capacitors tend to fail at a much higher rate. All capacitors have a polarity marking which usually mark the negative side and only go on one way. For the love humanity, DO NOT get the polarity wrong!
Your 9600 had Sacon FZ Caps which are pure crap. Sacon is known for making fraudulent solid capacitors with bare metal casings but they are nothing more than cheap, faulty electrolytic capacitors inside. My mame rig is running a recapped Nvidia 8600gt. Just last week i received a free Nvidia FX 2000 PCI that i couldn't bare to see thrown away. Both cards had Sacon FZ capacitors. I still need to buy two 16volt 1000 microfarad caps for the 5200 but the worst caps have been replaced.
My biggest gripe about buying capacitors is the fact that shipping is so expensive for a capacitor that cost you 80 cents at the most.
Hope this helps you my friend.