Doug Winterburn wrote:
Well, if one or more does act "funny" like my wifes old Dell, it may
well be a result of bad electrolytic capacitors. Her PC started
hanging with no other indications. I opened it up and six or eight
of the electrolytics were bulging out the top. Sent the MB to these
guys:
http://www.badcaps.net/

Got it back for under a hundred bucks with every electrolytic on the
MB replaced. Been working great now for almost a year where it was
hanging every few hours before.

Apparently, the chiwanese have been shipping electrolytics for all
kinds of devices that were like many of their other products.

I also had a rocketfish wireless speaker receiver fail for the same
reason. I may try to see if I can replace the bad caps myself as I
already hard wired the surround speakers.

The cheapest components to produce the cheapest product doesn't always
pay off for the consumer.

Good point. I salvaged a 36" LCD TV that had bad capacitors. For about six
bucks worth of replacement caps and a couple of hours with a screwdriver and
soldering iron, the TV is as good as new.