On Wed, 13 Aug 2008 12:46:21 -0400, clare at snyder ... wrote:
On 13 Aug 2008 04:27:44 GMT, "DoN. Nichols" ... wrote:
On 2008-08-13, clare at snyder dot ontario dot canada clare wrote:
On Tue, 12 Aug 2008 21:49:24 -0400, Al Patrick wrote:
....
I've had several flatscreens fail just off warranty. Problem was
traced down to a couple electrolytic caps that had swelled. Nobody
local had them in stock so I ebayed 10 of each out of HongKong of all
places - japanese caps - for less than I could have bought them out of
the states without the shipping. A couple minutes with the soldering
iron and all 3 back in service - with spare parts for 2 more.

Hmm ... IIRC, the cause of the swelling capacitors was some
manufacturer (Chinese, I think) buying a stolen formula for electrolyte
from a Japanese source. But the stolen formula had a problem, and
capacitors made with that formula tend to swell and die within a couple
of years. It strikes me that your Hong Kong ones may well be ones made
with the stolen formula, and likely to die just like the originals did.
....
no the ones from HongKong are japanese built Sanyo units.

According to http://www.techmati.com/articles/caps/index.htm the
Japanese brands Panasonic, Rubycon, Sanyo, and Nichicon are all
good. That article lists about 25 companies (apparently mostly
Chinese and Taiwanese) known to have produced bad caps.
Also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague
and its links to some 2003 and 2006 IEEE Spectrum articles about
the problem.

-jiw