MyITkb.net

The on board power supplies (on the motherboard) have faulty capacitors which may have caused the processor to fry and consequently the temperature control and fan driver is faulty. This is a known fault from 2005 when Dell had problems with the Mean-Time-Before Failure of the 1500uF Capacitors (and subsequently others too) on the Motherboard. They have a “X” stamped on the top of them.

Faults consist of Fan Running High all the time, Video shutting down (but remote connection is still possible) HDD errors (IDE drivers supply damaged) Not Booting, Random shutdowns.

Dell had a “CRP” Capacitor Replacement Program for affected computers which was free (This process closed last year) Where a motherboard swap was required (10 min job – I did over 100 at my company) This also affected early GX280’s and also some of the replacement Motherboards had duff capacitors too. Another fault on the new motherboards was the Boot Up failing due to the BIOS being left in manufacturing mode. This was easily fixed by connecting the PC via it’s ethernet port to a network (with a DHCP server running) Where the Motherboard would think it was connected to Dell and complete the Manufacturing process and return you to BIOS.

You can try flashing the BIOS but I did the same and it made no difference. In fact I replaced the Motherboards and it still happened, the cure was to replace the processor from a scrap PC.

According to sources the Capacitor problem was due to poor electrolyte in the capacitors (Michron) not Dell’s fault. Micron’s chemist left the company taking the formula with him – allegedly. Therefore a compromise was arrived at to fulfil the companies orders. Unfortunately the capacitors were failing after a few hours of service depending on the ambient temperature and the lenght of time the computer is powered. My computers are powered 24/7/365 and their location ambient temperature varies from 18′c – 50′c

Dell was not the only company to suffer from bad capacitors… Apple, Bose, Audi cars… etc etc.

Good luck – it has taken me a long time to purge the bad PCs – Now all my GX270s have all been scrapped.

If the fan is running incredablly it is the heat sink,
I had two of them do it, they became so loud that the service tech on the phone asked me to turn off my blow dryer while I was talking to him…He found out that was my computer.

In Karachi, PK its 36+ degree celcius these days and I was having the same problem with my DELL Optiplex GX280 SFF. The fan was blowing like the engines of an aeroplane then I went to Galaxy Computers in downtown Karachi to fix this problem and they did in just 5minutes. Now its running absolutely soundless and when I run some heavy game or extract or run movies it starts to blow but not like a 747 :) They just applied a COOLING SOLUTION from a syringe between the processor and the heat sink.

Thanks for the useful info. It’s so interesting