Motherboard Problem

[ppl4golf]

Hi,

I was just installing my new 9600GT and found out my MSI K9N Platinum SLI mobo (NF570) has a blackish slightly sticky layer of gooish coat near the PCI slots, it might even be radiating from the NB heatsink (which are all known to be pretty hot for all my Nvidia mobos).

Everything works and the mobo seems to be fine and runs 24/7 for at least a year.

I previously had a silent 8500GT which was hot so I modded an internal fan blowing onto the NB and the video card's heatsink.

I just wonder if something is leaking or if it is just the PCB ?

TIA!

[board123]

Can you take a picture of this so-called "goo?"

[ppl4golf]

I'll do it when I get home.

I noticed it because of the matted appearance instead of the glossy surface of the PCB elsewhere.

[willy]

Bad (leaking) caps ? But I haven't seen them in the recent generations of motherboards ...

[ppl4golf]

Bad (leaking) caps ?

Would it not kill the mobo ? or rather, is it going to kill the mobo?? LOL

The area is pretty extensive, probably spans 2-3 PCI slots across

[board123]

Looking at this picture of the board, there's only one capacitor near the orange slot.

http://www.ixbt.com/mainboard/msi/k9n-sli-platinum/board-sm.jpg

Are you actually talking about the PCI-E slots? There are capacitors next to each of the first three PCI-E slots. The northbridge shouldn't be leaking stuff.

[ppl4golf]

your link doesn't work from where I am now

also edit on stability issue :
I tried both PCI-E slots, and the computer crashed once on the PCI-E slot further away from the CPU but not on the one I've been using which is near the CPU.
too early to speculate, will try to post a picture.

[ppl4golf]

http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h158/ppl4golf/IMG_6327.jpg

I used a kleenex to diffuse the flash so the ***** you see is not reflection!

[terrybear]

Kinda look like melting/degration from heat, I'd concider rma'in the motherboard.

Makes me glad I got rid of my nforce chipset based motherboards a LONG time ago !! :P

[ppl4golf]

Kinda look like melting/degration from heat, I'd concider rma'in the motherboard.

Makes me glad I got rid of my nforce chipset based motherboards a LONG time ago !! :P

Immediately after I took the pix, I used a gauze and wiped off the crap and it's all nice and clean now. It felt WD40 like.

There is no major capacitor in around of the affected area - strange! I have no clue.

[willy]

I too think it's like the top shiny layer of the motherboard has melted or something ...

[willy]

Immediately after I took the pix, I used a gauze and wiped off the crap and it's all nice and clean now. It felt WD40 like.

There is no major capacitor in around of the affected area - strange! I have no clue.
Smell like WD40 too ? The thing is .. Where did it come from ?

[sickcars]

You said you modded a fan to blow on your old video card? Did you happen to put some kind of oil on the fan? or maybe the fan was dirty and it slowly blew it on the motherboard?

[ppl4golf]

You said you modded a fan to blow on your old video card? Did you happen to put some kind of oil on the fan? or maybe the fan was dirty and it slowly blew it on the motherboard?

Hey,
that's a good thought, as a matter of fact, I did put some mineral oil on some old fans I had laying around, not sure if I did on that particular one.
I'll open the case up later and see if the MSI heatsink feels a little slick as well.

[board123]

If it feels like oil then that's probably the stuff you put into the fan.

When I melted a HD3850 core a few months ago, some oily substance leaked out of the GPU. That's probably not the case for your motherboard though.