Damaged capacitors on the nForce 4 SLI chipset

[Zdzislaw]

Hi,

I damaged two capacitors on my nF4 SLI chipset while mounting a waterblock. I want to have them replaced but I need to know the voltage and capacitance of the caps to buy the replacement. Please don't tell me I screwed it, because I know I did. Now I have to try to repair it, so I will be grateful for any tips.

Here are he damaged caps:
http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/7804/nforce4sli0zi.th.jpg (http://img246.imageshack.us/my.php?image=nforce4sli0zi.jpg)

[madgravity34]

One thing I would try is see if you can measure the resistance across one of the working ones.

[crodan85]

Im not an expert but the the cap size is 0403 or 0603 for the cap voltage 16v should be enough. For the cap value either wait for somone with DMM to mesure the capacitance of there chipset caps or try and get/lend a multimeter.

[Zdzislaw]

Are all the caps on the chipset the same?

[QuikSilver]

Those are resistors, not caps, right?

[Zdzislaw]

Hmmm, they could be resistors. My DMM can't measure their capacitance but the resistance of the other two I checked is 48,7 Ohms and 63 Ohms

[persivore]

They are capacitors. The resistance that you are measuring will be from the other things they are connected to. I would think the board would probably work ok without them in place.

[craig588]

By the time you've tilted it enough to touch the caps you could have chipped the core.

[Zdzislaw]

By the time you've tilted it enough to touch the caps you could have chipped the core.

That's plausible, anyway I'd like to give it a try. I can replace caps myself but I can't replace the whole chipset myself. I'm still waiting for the specs of the caps

[Calderbrae]

They are capacitors. The resistance that you are measuring will be from the other things they are connected to. I would think the board would probably work ok without them in place.


Agreed. :)

The only question would be whether the potential difference across the missing caps was needed to bridge some connection.

[hipro5]

The most common capacitors are 100nf or 220nf .....They are too tiny so you HAVE to be carefull not to "melt" the PCB of the chip......As persivore said(clad to have him with us), it should work even without them - well maybe not fully working but it should work - .....

[Micutzu]

I get a 15.7uF readout when measuring them in circuit ... probably they're 100-220nF as hipro5 said, paralelled with larger ones from the mobo. Just use any SMD caps, the larger the better :).