Dell Optiplex GX260 SFF PC

[MysticGold04]

Hi All,

I was just given an Optiplex GX260 small form factor PC that I have already loaded Linux Mint 5 XFCE on. I plan to make this a 'folder' machine.. 2Ghz P4, 768MB ram, 20gb hdd, nothing special...

Anyhow, I have noticed that one of the caps near the processor has leaked a little out of the top.
First of all, is this common for this PC? and secondly - I assume it would be easy to fix once I found a replacement cap.

 

[simple_gifts]

Quote:

First of all, is this common for this PC?


Search the site for GX260,GX270; lots of complaints.

http://www.badcaps.net/pages.php?vid=2

 

[VK56VD]

If you add more ram, it should perform fairly well for Internet browsing. That machine may take 2 sticks of 1 GB.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

heck, you can search THIS site for bad capacitors. It's VERY common.

 

[greenaccord02]

Yes, this is unbelievably common for your computer. Sorry. If you're good with a soldering iron you could remove the board and buy a new set of capacitors and install them. The failing caps have been thought to shorten lifespan of RAM used in the system by supplying unregulated voltage. Make sure the system has adequate or better airflow. Adequate would mean better than when it was new.

 

[brianl703]

It is important to note that the GX260, GX270, and GX280 look identical, but they each use different motherboards. In particular, the GX260 and GX270 do not even use the same Intel chipset.

The GX270 and GX280 are far more problematic than the GX260 in the capacitor department. A search on badcaps.net turns up only one post about capacitor issues with the GX260.

 

[MysticGold04]

Yes, I too searched there and only saw the one complaint. There also no kits ready made. All of the other caps look to be in good shape, I wonder if I can just replace the one cap and be fine... or just run the PC until it fails, and then worry about it.

 

[greenaccord02]

Originally Posted By: MysticGold04
Yes, I too searched there and only saw the one complaint. There also no kits ready made. All of the other caps look to be in good shape, I wonder if I can just replace the one cap and be fine... or just run the PC until it fails, and then worry about it.


Yeah, just get the stuff written on the side of the swollen capacitor and bring it to radioshack or to an online vendor. It probably won't cost a dollar for a replacement.

As far as the commonality of these failures goes, it seemed to depend on the batch of computers. Some shipments will live out their lives without issue, but some shipments had boards that were made the day after chinese new years or so it seemed.

 

[ATS-V]

I have one of each at home, GX260 running Linux and a GX270 that my wife used of browsing and email running XP Pro.

As a matter of fact I just upgraded the processor on the GX260 from a P4 2GHz to P4 3.06GHz w/hyperthreading.

Oh I forgot, does suspend work in Linux Mint with a GX260? It took me months to get that feature to work.

 

[Bottom_Feeder]

Originally Posted By: Spartuss
If you add more ram, it should perform fairly well for Internet browsing. That machine may take 2 sticks of 1 GB.


Huh? 768mb is PLENTY of system RAM for a general-use Internet browsing PC. What makes you think it isn't?

But secondly, that's not even what he's using it for.

 

[greenaccord02]

Originally Posted By: 97 GTP

Oh I forgot, does suspend work in Linux Mint with a GX260? It took me months to get that feature to work.


It should in Linux mint 7+ or so I understand.

 

[brianl703]

Originally Posted By: greenaccord02

Yeah, just get the stuff written on the side of the swollen capacitor and bring it to radioshack or to an online vendor. It probably won't cost a dollar for a replacement.


I like Digi-Key because they'll ship small orders via 1st class mail, so shipping will be under $2.

 

[brianl703]

Originally Posted By: Bottom_Feeder

Huh? 768mb is PLENTY of system RAM for a general-use Internet browsing PC. What makes you think it isn't?


I find that if I open enough tabs, the peak commit charge will exceed 768MB in XP.

 

[ATS-V]

Originally Posted By: greenaccord02
Originally Posted By: 97 GTP

Oh I forgot, does suspend work in Linux Mint with a GX260? It took me months to get that feature to work.


It should in Linux mint 7+ or so I understand.


I had issues all the way up to Ubuntu 8.04 with suspend, a VBE quirk finally solved it for me. The funny thing is I never use suspend, but knowing it was working was bothering me until I fixed it.

 

[greenaccord02]

Well 7 is based on 9.04 and I think it was taken care of by that time, or at least a lot more work was done to make it work better. There is probably a mint 8 out now, but I don't know.