leaky/crusty looking capacitor on a MB

Quote from larrymoencurly : Spending caps for $10-20 (delivered price) will probably result in a motherboard that can easily least at least 5 more years. OTOH a $10 eBay replacement motherboard has a good chance of containing bad caps and failing soon.

Quote from Curtieson : It could also result in a board that doesn't work at all.

True for both the repair and the eBay motherboard, and failure in either case can be chaulked as a reason for revenge learning experience. :

My track record with at least 15 bad mobos (probably 20) has been 2 that couldn't be repaired, including one I didn't even try fixing (north bridge ran really hot, Nvidia chipset). Yes, both of the unrepairables were made by ECS; how did you know?

Quote from larrymoencurly : Assuming the person has full backups of their data. Everybody makes backups, right?

Quote from skrooks : If you've got leaking caps, I would backup anything important you've got on that computer and I wouldn't trust it with anything important. If you've got one capacitor going bad, don't be surprised when other caps that are of the same brand and relative size start going bad as well. When caps go bad on a motherboard, the computer will probably start having symptoms like randomly turning off and not booting all the way. I haven't ever tried replacing caps on a motherboard because of how cramped the components tend to be and it just seems more prone to messing something up. If you decide to get some replacement capacitors, I agree that DigiKey is a good place to go.

Aside from a BSOD at an inopportune time, how else would a leaky cap on a mobo affect the magnetically stored data on the platter of his hard drive?

As for the OP's question, yes you should replace the cap if you have the right tools to cleanly pull the old one off and enough room to pop the new one in without mucking up anything nearby.

Quote from godfather927 : Aside from a BSOD at an inopportune time, how else would a leaky cap on a mobo affect the magnetically stored data on the platter of his hard drive?

I don't know the exact answer to that question, but I can tell you that I've seen computers that took a bad hit from our erratic electricity, and the hard drive got zapped into uselessness, so it may be possible that if a mobo fries, that it take out other components at the same time.

Quote from RockySosua : I don't know the exact answer to that question, but I can tell you that I've seen computers that took a bad hit from our erratic electricity, and the hard drive got zapped into uselessness, so it may be possible that if a mobo fries, that it take out other components at the same time.

You seem to be referring to a power surge of some sort or dirty power that killed your PSU... a leaky mobo cap wont matter in either case in terms of protecting an HDD.

Quote from godfather927 : You seem to be referring to a power surge of some sort or dirty power that killed your PSU... a leaky mobo cap wont matter in either case in terms of protecting an HDD.

I hear ya, but I'm just not sure that it can't happen.
Let's put it another way. If I saw that I had bad caps on a computer that had precious data. I would copy all that data, just to not take a chance.
I started fiddling with electronics when I was a wee kid and I've seen all sorts of unexpected and weird things happen. so I've learned to expect surprises. like the mobo sending current down a data cable and damaging the stored data.
I'm not saying you're wrong in assuming that the HD is safe from a bad mobo. I'm just saying that I wouldn't take the chance.

Quote from godfather927 : Aside from a BSOD at an inopportune time, how else would a leaky cap on a mobo affect the magnetically stored data on the platter of his hard drive?

A bad cap or any disturbance in the power can make the computer write junk data to the HD, but that's about it.

Quote from larrymoencurly : A bad cap or any disturbance in the power can make the computer write junk data to the HD, but that's about it.

This is more inline with what i was thinking. The chances of wiping it completely seem immeasurably low but still a good practice and advice that should always be heeded none the less.

Quote from Curtieson : It could also result in a board that doesn't work at all. What is the socket? I'll send you one of the random boards I have in the basement for shipping and $5 gas money they are mostly P4's. They worked fine, but were replaced by faster machines at work and parted out. I guess that means they are most likely Socket 478 or Socket 775...I am not sure which but can check. Just shoot me a PM if mildly interested and we can get details. Not looking to make a ton of money, they are just sitting there and the Wife wants me to throw them away anyway.

Too bad I'm so far away.
I have a bunch of dead PC's, that if I had mobos for, I could fix them up and give them to some of the needy locals.
Unlike larrymoemcurly, I do not have the ability nor equipment to repair mobos. For me, once they are dead, that's the end of that party. so I have lot's of extra cases, DVD's, old IDE hard drives, ram and maybe even a few old power supplies that still work, and it's just the mobos that stand in the way of a functional system.
Considering the transport costs to import merchandise, combined with the unreliability of buying fleabay used products, that's not much of an option for me.
The local computer store sells old refurbished XP machines, mostly Dell's with Pentium 4 CPU's, 1 or more gigs of ram, a small hard drive (20 to 40 gig) and CD or DVD, for $75 to $100, so it's not worth me spending much money on mobo's to go with all the PC junk that I have accumulated in my warehouse cemetery.
Like I said, too bad I'm so far away, otherwise I could put those old mobo's you have, to good use.

Quote from RockySosua : Like I said, too bad I'm so far away, otherwise I could put those old mobo's you have, to good use.

"Well, maybe we could figure out something..... Caribbean? yea, nm...probably not"

I need to just get them working and put them out for ~$20 to help out some needy people...that is what I need to do...but I'm lazy.

i think i found what the leaky/crusty capacitor effects.

the computer lost about 2 hours in BIOS time.

i just changed the CMOS battery about 3 weeks ago.

i had the switch on the PSU off.

Pics of leaky/crusty looking capacitor would be helpful.