Wiki Review: Capacitor Replacement

[wthww]

Hello MLAers,

I did some work tonight on bringing over the Capacitor Replacement page. I'll finish up bringing the missing media over this week, but I took some time to clean up the page a bit in the process.

Would anyone mind taking a breeze through the cap values, or maybe add missing machines?

Second, would the "bottom" section of the page that has cap values for each model be better broken out into model pages with pictures/tables instead of bullets?

Thanks,

//wthww

EDIT: "tonight" to this week.

 

[Phipli]

Hello MLAers,

I did some work tonight on bringing over the Capacitor Replacement page. I'll finish up bringing the missing media over tonight, but I took some time to clean up the page a bit in the process.

Would anyone mind taking a breeze through the cap values, or maybe add missing machines?

Second, would the "bottom" section of the page that has cap values for each model be better broken out into model pages with pictures/tables instead of bullets?

Thanks,

//wthww

If you want to keep it simple but safe - replace all the 47uF 16v tantalum references with 25v.

25v work perfectly in place of a 16v (a little more expensive), but some of those locations are on the 12v rails. While a 16v electrolytic tin can is fine on 12v, a tantalum is meant to be at least 100% uprated (so 24v, with 25v being the next standard value).

A blanket change of 47uF 16v to 47uF 25v for tantalums is a safe change that corrects this issue without having to sit and work through which exact caps are actually on 12v.

 

[Phipli]

Yeah, I've started, but we do need to either put all 47uFs to 25v, or work out specifically which caps are on the 12v rail and bump just those. My preference is the latter, I made a start with the LC III (because it didn't capture the other issue with the -5v cap), but need to start work now. I'll look again later.

 

[cheesestraws]

I wonder if it might be a good thing to revisit the blanket advice to use tantalums - solid polymer capacitors are more available now than they used to be and they have the profound advantage of not catching fire if you install them wrong, along with not containing conflict minerals

 

[Phipli]

I wonder if it might be a good thing to revisit the blanket advice to use tantalums - solid polymer capacitors are more available now than they used to be and they have the profound advantage of not catching fire if you install them wrong, along with not containing conflict minerals

I think a section explaining the options (if you're short of cash, regular wet electrolytics are a valid option - reasonable ones will likely last at least 20 more years even if none of us want to go through it again). Let's make the body of the document generic (separate the 5v and 12v caps so people can use the information) and put a section at the top explaining so people can make an informed decision. We can even make recommendations - I'm just aware that, for example, I don't feel comfortable telling someone to do something I haven't myself and I haven't used solid polymer caps because I have a stockpile of tantalums. That would sort of weirdly make it harder to contribute and I was... Well, I was about to.

I also want to add a "this is the positive end!" Section at the top, with pictures.

I want to go through schematics and separate out the 12v caps. Including for things like the 650 / 800 and IIfx, because both suffer from occasional explosions due to 16v tantalums being used on 12v rails from factory. They are worth recapping just those on those machines.

 

[croissantking]

Would anyone mind taking a breeze through the cap values, or maybe add missing machines?

Yeah I'll happily contribute to this.

Second, would the "bottom" section of the page that has cap values for each model be better broken out into model pages with pictures/tables instead of bullets?

I think broken out into separate pages would be better. Each machine might eventually have a cap list for a PSU and maybe an analog board, in addition to photos and diagrams.

I wonder if it might be a good thing to revisit the blanket advice to use tantalums - solid polymer capacitors are more available now than they used to be and they have the profound advantage of not catching fire if you install them wrong, along with not containing conflict minerals

I like polymers, but they're a bit more expensive... and also for a lot of the laptop stuff I do, are too big or not available in certain values.

I mainly just use good quality electrolytics now - manufacturing quality has dramatically improved since the early days, so I think they'll be safe for a long time to come.

I do understand the preference for tantalums that most people have since at least in theory they'll last indefinitely.

 

[cheesestraws]

I also want to add a "this is the positive end!" Section at the top, with pictures.

Ah yeah, this is a good idea. Bloody Tantalums.

 

[Phipli]

I think broken out into separate pages would be better. Each machine might eventually have a cap list for a PSU and maybe an analog board, in addition to photos and diagrams.

I agree... But hold off until we do an update pass so that we can do the update all in one place. It will mean less copy and paste.

Also finalise the introduction text because we'll have to put it on every page

 

[croissantking]

I agree... But hold off until we do an update pass so that we can do the update all in one place. It will mean less copy and paste.

Also finalise the introduction text because we'll have to put it on every page

Sure I won't touch it

 

[3lectr1cPPC]

I see a few things that should be changed.

- Note the 25V distinction with Tantalums as mentioned

- Hardly anyone uses the described method for removing the original capacitors. No one can agree on what the best method for doing this is (twisting them off, hot air, clipping them off, soldering tweezers, etc) so the best approach is probably to describe each method and tell the reader to experiment and find which they prefer using.

- If you are going to provide capacitor reference information directly on the Wiki, it should absolutely be split into separate pages for each machine. That being said, there are already multiple established community sources for this information and so it may make more sense to simply link to them rather than trying to duplicate all the information directly on the wiki. Existing resources include my own website and recapamac, among others.

- Include photos showing examples of cap leakage

- I would advise against putting boards in the dishwasher. Not because I'm particularly concerned about damaging the board, but because you don't want trace amounts of capacitor goo and whatever other toxic material ending up on your clean dishes. There are ways of cleaning the board that work just as well (IPA + toothbrush works great and doesn't require waiting for it to dry, and an ultrasonic cleaner perhaps works best of all methods if you do have one available).

 

[wthww]

Thanks for the pointers @3lectr1cPPC! I'm generally onboard with updates.

The macdat stuff is great! I think the goal with the wiki is to make an "officially unofficial" source that is focused just on the macs we know and love (and is of course community specific). How would you feel about including info from macdat on the wiki? The one thing I'd like to make sure you're on board for is how the wiki is licensed (GNU FDL).

//wthww

 

[Phipli]

How would you feel about including info from macdat on the wiki?

On this point, while it is for @3lectr1cPPC to decide, as I've watched sites vanish over the years and information go (it's much harder to get info on overclocking ~1996 era PPCs at the moment - I need to write it up and bring it back from the internet archive), I personally feel it is best to have as many copies of any data available in multiple styles and formats to try to make sure it survives into the future.

I'm kind of sad that I haven't seen much stuff copied from my website yet, although I have had people repeat my own posts back to me and even once link me to my own site

 

[3lectr1cPPC]

How would you feel about including info from macdat on the wiki? The one thing I'd like to make sure you're on board for is how the wiki is licensed (GNU FDL).

I have no problem with people reproducing the capacitor reference data on the wiki. I will note however that if you also wanted to include images, the vast majority of reference photos in MacDat's cap reference library were sent to me by other people. You would have to reach out to them to ask if it's fine they also be used on the Wiki. I do give permission for ones I've taken to be used, provided they aren't modified. If you aren't sure if a photo is mine or someone else's, feel free to DM me and ask.

I don't however know much about the details of the GNU license and would rather they just be used in an "I give this site permission to use my photos" capacity and nothing further than that. The reference data itself I feel isn't copyrightable one way or the other because it isn't a creative work.

On this point, while it is for @3lectr1cPPC to decide, as I've watched sites vanish over the years and information go (it's much harder to get info on overclocking ~1996 era PPCs at the moment - I need to write it up and bring it back from the internet archive), I personally feel it is best to have as many copies of any data available in multiple styles and formats to try to make sure it survives into the future.

Oh I feel you! I've done thousands of hours of research for my Laptop Portal project and so much of it is just crawling through dead sites on the WayBack Machine and hoping the info survives somewhere. Preserving this info is why I made the site in the first place. MacDat isn't going anywhere until I'm dead. (and I'm gonna have an offline download system set-up at some point in the near future as a contingency for if/when that happens haha).

 

[wthww]

I have no problem with people reproducing the capacitor reference data on the wiki. I will note however that if you also wanted to include images, the vast majority of reference photos in MacDat's cap reference library were sent to me by other people. You would have to reach out to them to ask if it's fine they also be used on the Wiki. I do give permission for ones I've taken to be used, provided they aren't modified

That's awesome and well understood. We'll come up with a way to credit your site too.

MacDat isn't going anywhere until I'm dead. (and I'm gonna have an offline download system set-up at some point in the near future as a contingency for if/when that happens haha

We're thinking about this too with the new iteration of the wiki; we've installed the PDF and WikiBook plugins to allow an on-demand exact export of pages or entire sections. DokuWiki is also unique in that it's very easy to export the entire thing, including media, as it uses flatfiles. Eventually I'd like to setup the wiki to automatically export using the sitexport plugin and have a page of recent export files to download.

 

[3lectr1cPPC]

We're thinking about this too with the new iteration of the wiki; we've installed the PDF and WikiBook plugins to allow an on-demand exact export of pages or entire sections. DokuWiki is also unique in that it's very easy to export the entire thing, including media, as it uses flatfiles. Eventually I'd like to setup the wiki to automatically export using the sitexport plugin and have a page of recent export files to download.

I like this a lot. One of the reasons I think many (myself included) would be hesitant to contribute to the wiki is that it has been so frequently offline for long stretches of time. This combats that somewhat, although I think the most important thing y'all can really do is make sure that it stays up from now on.