PS3 (Research/Experimental) - NEC/TOKIN Capacitors Replacement - YLOD

my ps3 20gb was reballed and when tried GT6 and TLOU shuts off.
When I removed all top nec tokins and change them with Tantalum capacitors the problem was solve, so I say can be Bad tokins or bad BGA so we need test if is one or other
 
my ps3 20gb was reballed and when tried GT6 and TLOU shuts off.
When I removed all top nec tokins and change them with Tantalum capacitors the problem was solve, so I say can be Bad tokins or bad BGA so we need test if is one or other
That's a blacky one, mmm hmm..


It's all in the YLOD behaviour. If you have an instant YLOD, then there's a short somewhere, either on the mobo, the NECs, the BGAs under a processor, or even a processor with a broken die. But if you have non-instant YLOD, then the party is about to begin.

A couple of examples of a instant YLOD:

https://imgur.com/a/pTT8lpo (turn on the audio in the video)

A non instant YLOD, that's quite fast (this depends of the state of the NECs on the RSX mostly):

https://imgur.com/a/1jU12z2

So today I was trying to revive a "H" that had non-instant YLOD (video above), so I believed it was a NEC related problem, and also when I was turning on the console, the PS3 was sending a signal that makes the TV change its state, from "No signal" to black/blank screen before turning off, that tells you something, so it's important. Normally the PS3 without a HDD won't give image until a few seconds, but in this case, when you have a problem with the RSX energy supply, the TV will receive a special signal that put it in blank, if your TV is IPS, 'cause if it is QLED you won't notice the change of colour, due the qualities of this one.

So, the next thing I did was changing 2 NECs on the RSX from the opposite site for 8 tantalums, still the same non-instant YLOD.

Next step: Removing the other 2 NECs from the RSX but not putting any tantalums on those, result: GLOD. This is the clear proof that NECs can be damaged and can produce a YLOD. Also, I did heat the 8 NECs before even start, so those 2 were clearly bad, damaged and needed a punishment. Don't worry, you won't know about them anymore, they got what they deserved.

Next: I put 6 tantalums on the empty spaces I left before, and this is what I got: https://i.imgur.com/T8KD2Xa.jpg

Moral of this story, always see what kind of YLOD you have, and don't trust on those mother..
 
From user @squeept
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Good GPU TOKINS: https://i.imgur.com/zzNXQVs.jpg
Bad GPU TOKINS: https://i.imgur.com/LNit0tL.png
- --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- -
Good CPU TOKINS: https://i.imgur.com/vCSGUVB.jpg
Bad CPU TOKINS: https://i.imgur.com/Nl4sfTu.png
- --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- - --- -

However, oscilloscopes can be expensive if you don't have one already, so for sure it's not a cheap option to find out this way. I think squeept was recommending some oscilloscopes, but i forget which page that was from. There are probably some cheap clones from China also, but i can't say what the quality will be like.

If you could borrow one, or rent one, then yeah for sure it would be good to test the NECs with an oscilloscope, otherwise not sure.

i forgot to tall you i used to heat my ps3 with towel and hairdryer when i got ylod and after that it works does that meaning the nes is bad
 
i forgot to tall you i used to heat my ps3 with towel and hairdryer when i got ylod and after that it works does that meaning the nes is bad

Hiya, i see, sorry i thought you said:- it didn't work after you tried that. O.k, well that's some good news. Some people would say:- the BGA needs a reflow / reball, and some people would say:- it's the NECs that are bad and need replacing.

It's up to you which way you go at first. I guess the capacitor route might be easier. And there is a way (if you really wanted) to put new NEC/Tokins back on your board, instead of Tantalums. But it seems the NEC/Tokins come from Chinese sellers only now, so they could be already used ones, or old ones, or 2nd rate quality, or even fake / clone ones. But a user here bought some and they worked for his Ps3, so it could be an option to try also.
 
Towel and a hair dryer, jeez man......reminds me of a video I once watched where a kid stuck a butter knife in the back of his ps3 for who knows what and it shot sparks everywhere and made the kid shit his pants
 
Towel and a hair dryer, jeez man......reminds me of a video I once watched where a kid stuck a butter knife in the back of his ps3 for who knows what and it shot sparks everywhere and made the kid shit his pants
Never laughed more in my life, from a simple stupidity, almost flipped my chair afterwards, i would watch it again, but can't find the video unfortunately, but it was a good gag [emoji1787][emoji1787]

Sent from my G8141 using Tapatalk
 
Hiya, i see, sorry i thought you said:- it didn't work after you tried that. O.k, well that's some good news. Some people would say:- the BGA needs a reflow / reball, and some people would say:- it's the NECs that are bad and need replacing.

It's up to you which way you go at first. I guess the capacitor route might be easier. And there is a way (if you really wanted) to put new NEC/Tokins back on your board, instead of Tantalums. But it seems the NEC/Tokins come from Chinese sellers only now, so they could be already used ones, or old ones, or 2nd rate quality, or even fake / clone ones. But a user here bought some and they worked for his Ps3, so it could be an option to try also.

i guess tantalum capacitor would be good i don't want use nec again and gave me ylod after while but do u know what is the best way to remove nec

Towel and a hair dryer, jeez man......reminds me of a video I once watched where a kid stuck a butter knife in the back of his ps3 for who knows what and it shot sparks everywhere and made the kid shit his pants

ضحكت من سرك بله
 
I got another PS3 I found for cheap, this time it's an original 60GB A01 model.

This thing was never opened as it had the original warranty sticker intact. Also the printing on the CELL was perfect, it wasn't faded at all, some of the chips on the motherboard - I assume has some relation to the PS2 hardware - is much larger than on my personal E01 model.

All the thermal paste looks original as it's white and feels more like chalky silicone. But it's been spread very evenly.


The ONLY problem - it's been damaged. The entire bottom shell is cracked. When trying to open it, there were 3 screws that would not back out, they just kept spinning. I had to use a clamp to hold the shells together on the backside so that they had enough resistance to get the screws out. The evidence of damage suggests it was dropped on the very corner of the shell where the power supply connects to.

I'll try to get pics later on and edit this post with them.


My initial findings is that there is some other issue that is triggering the YLOD. Heating the NECs and processors didn't do a lick of difference. Just instant YLOD. Because it was dropped where the power is plugged into, it may indicate a damaged power supply, possibly.

I'm going to swap out the power supply with the one of my repaired 80GB that I screwed up the delid for before sending it to squeept
 
Never laughed more in my life, from a simple stupidity, almost flipped my chair afterwards, i would watch it again, but can't find the video unfortunately, but it was a good gag [emoji1787][emoji1787]

Sent from my G8141 using Tapatalk
Yeah I look to I couldn't find it again either it was some funny ass stuff
 
I got another PS3 I found for cheap, this time it's an original 60GB A01 model.

This thing was never opened as it had the original warranty sticker intact. Also the printing on the CELL was perfect, it wasn't faded at all, some of the chips on the motherboard - I assume has some relation to the PS2 hardware - is much larger than on my personal E01 model.

All the thermal paste looks original as it's white and feels more like chalky silicone. But it's been spread very evenly.


The ONLY problem - it's been damaged. The entire bottom shell is cracked. When trying to open it, there were 3 screws that would not back out, they just kept spinning. I had to use a clamp to hold the shells together on the backside so that they had enough resistance to get the screws out. The evidence of damage suggests it was dropped on the very corner of the shell where the power supply connects to.

I'll try to get pics later on and edit this post with them.


My initial findings is that there is some other issue that is triggering the YLOD. Heating the NECs and processors didn't do a lick of difference. Just instant YLOD. Because it was dropped where the power is plugged into, it may indicate a damaged power supply, possibly.

I'm going to swap out the power supply with the one of my repaired 80GB that I screwed up the delid for before sending it to squeept

Hi, i remember someone saying (i think) in this thread, that a dropped Ps3 could produce cracks on the RSX / CELL BGAs, and that a reflow might have to be done in that case.
 
Hi, i remember someone saying (i think) in this thread, that a dropped Ps3 could produce cracks on the RSX / CELL BGAs, and that a reflow might have to be done in that case.

You know, you may be right. I should have thought about this myself. I've been so excited about my previous repair that I forgot about reflowing.

Definitely gonna give this a try this weekend.
 
i guess tantalum capacitor would be good i don't want use nec again and gave me ylod after while but do u know what is the best way to remove nec

I like to cut them out with a stanley knife, using a new blade. First cut the top black plastic off, from top down, but leave a little margin from the edge all around - like 1 to 2mm margin. So you cut out a rectangle shape on the top and then remove that part (the plastic is very thin, so you don't need to cut deep). Now you can see - inside the NECs is made of about 5 x thin layers of metal.

Now to remove the rest of the black plastic, so with the knife resting on the top of the (de-capped) NEC, right above where the tinned (+) contact strips are (where the NECs are soldered to the board, at each end), cut straight down (vertical cut) the plastic only in one slow motion, so that the blade finishes by touching the tinned contact (+) strip on the board, do this in each corner of the NEC.

Then with a pair of tweezers, just pluck the 4 black plastic lengths of the NEC upwards, and off the board. Now you are left with the 5 x thin metal layers. Leave the very ends (which are soldered down) and move just past the ends (slightly towards the middle) where the layers are no longer soldered there, and with the tip /point of a sharp stanley knife, wedge it under the first layer and lift it up enough to get your tweezers under, then grip hard with the tweezers and pull up and peel the metal layer away towards the other end. Do this for each of the 5 thin metal layers.

After this, you will be left with just the piles at the ends that are soldered down, i find gripping them together with a pair of pliers and just pulling / peeling them up (from left to right) is a good way to get the ends to come all up together in one go.

Make sure to protect around the area in case of slips with tools, it's very easy to knock off a tiny capacitor near by, but it's very hard to put it back on again, so put electrical tape all around the area, as tight to the NECs as possible.
 
Towel and a hair dryer, jeez man......reminds me of a video I once watched where a kid stuck a butter knife in the back of his ps3 for who knows what and it shot sparks everywhere and made the kid shit his pants

Oh man you laugh, i did similar to that when i was 6. I shoved a butter knife into the back of our CRT T.V (through the air vents) while it was on, because the reception went down. Oh wow did it spark, it blew up actually in a huge bang, then my parents ran into the room. They still don't trust me with electronics. :rolleyes:
 
I like to cut them out with a stanley knife, using a new blade. First cut the top black plastic off, from top down, but leave a little margin from the edge all around - like 1 to 2mm margin. So you cut out a rectangle shape on the top and then remove that part (the plastic is very thin, so you don't need to cut deep). Now you can see - inside the NECs is made of about 5 x thin layers of metal.

Now to remove the rest of the black plastic, so with the knife resting on the top of the (de-capped) NEC, right above where the tinned (+) contact strips are (where the NECs are soldered to the board, at each end), cut straight down (vertical cut) the plastic only in one slow motion, so that the blade finishes by touching the tinned contact (+) strip on the board, do this in each corner of the NEC.

Then with a pair of tweezers, just pluck the 4 black plastic lengths of the NEC upwards, and off the board. Now you are left with the 5 x thin metal layers. Leave the very ends (which are soldered down) and move just past the ends (slightly towards the middle) where the layers are no longer soldered there, and with the tip /point of a sharp stanley knife, wedge it under the first layer and lift it up enough to get your tweezers under, then grip hard with the tweezers and pull up and peel the metal layer away towards the other end. Do this for each of the 5 thin metal layers.

After this, you will be left with just the piles at the ends that are soldered down, i find gripping them together with a pair of pliers and just pulling / peeling them up (from left to right) is a good way to get the ends to come all up together in one go.

Make sure to protect around the area in case of slips with tools, it's very easy to knock off a tiny capacitor near by, but it's very hard to put it back on again, so put electrical tape all around the area, as tight to the NECs as possible.

can you make video tutorial for that please
 
can you make video tutorial for that please

lol, well, i could but i already took off all of my NECs, i do have another PS3 that i'm working on soon, if i replace the NECs on that one i could aim to make some kind of tutorial, but i think you would have done the work yourself already before then.

You can do it any way you like, the black plastic is very thin and easy to come off, once removed you can see what was under the black plastic and you will see a way to get the rest to come up.

Or do a search on Youtube, for "NEC/Tokin removal" or "Removing NEC/Tokin" and watch how a few people do it, and get an idea what would suit you best. For me, i didn't want to use heat there, because melting plastic fumes would stink out my room lol, and i found it's pretty easy with a stanley knife, just take your time and go slow, checking each bit.
 
Hello..how can i test each NEC capacitor one by one by multimeter to find faulty one?

Hiya, with a multimeter you can't. You could with an oscilloscope. Also while the NECs are soldered to the board you can't measure them like you could normally with a multimeter, because they are part of the circuit.

However, you could try what esc0rtd3w did (from page 106 - see quote below, and view the photos / attachments) - where you solder 2 x wires to the (+) and (-) legs of one NEC, on the RSX, that go to a set of external capacitors {of your choice, but say 2 x 2200uF - 6.3V}.

If your board is COK-01, COK-02, SEM-01, then there is enough space to solder. But not for board revisions that come after, for those boards a person would have to scratch the surface to solder on the (+) and (-) of the NEC.

You could test like this maybe...

Just tried this on an E01 phat.

Well, I should say, I used the idea. I ended up just soldering two wires, one to negative, and one to positive, and then ran to two 2200uf 6.3v caps for testing and it boots right up.

I initially tried with one, thinking at least one was bad, but that actually kinda worked, but after about 10 seconds would cut off. After connecting the 2nd cap to make 4400uf total, it booted right up.

I think this method would be easier for people who don't want to take a chance destroying their existing caps. They are a bitch to remove.

I'm gonna wrap the new caps up in kapton and snug them to the inside of case! Done lolView attachment 25810 View attachment 25811

Anyways, good stuff. :)

Edit:
In case of confusion, those pics are from test lol. I will solder them securely and wrap them to protect.
 
I like to cut them out with a stanley knife, using a new blade. First cut the top black plastic off, from top down, but leave a little margin from the edge all around - like 1 to 2mm margin. So you cut out a rectangle shape on the top and then remove that part (the plastic is very thin, so you don't need to cut deep). Now you can see - inside the NECs is made of about 5 x thin layers of metal.

Now to remove the rest of the black plastic, so with the knife resting on the top of the (de-capped) NEC, right above where the tinned (+) contact strips are (where the NECs are soldered to the board, at each end), cut straight down (vertical cut) the plastic only in one slow motion, so that the blade finishes by touching the tinned contact (+) strip on the board, do this in each corner of the NEC.

Then with a pair of tweezers, just pluck the 4 black plastic lengths of the NEC upwards, and off the board. Now you are left with the 5 x thin metal layers. Leave the very ends (which are soldered down) and move just past the ends (slightly towards the middle) where the layers are no longer soldered there, and with the tip /point of a sharp stanley knife, wedge it under the first layer and lift it up enough to get your tweezers under, then grip hard with the tweezers and pull up and peel the metal layer away towards the other end. Do this for each of the 5 thin metal layers.

After this, you will be left with just the piles at the ends that are soldered down, i find gripping them together with a pair of pliers and just pulling / peeling them up (from left to right) is a good way to get the ends to come all up together in one go.

Make sure to protect around the area in case of slips with tools, it's very easy to knock off a tiny capacitor near by, but it's very hard to put it back on again, so put electrical tape all around the area, as tight to the NECs as possible.
This description abot how to remove them is pretty cool btw, i never did myself but by reading it i see is probably the safest way

At the first step, when cutting a rectangle on top you are pushing vertically, and you have the 5 metal layers at bottom that are going to stop the knife incase you do it with excesive force... so no danger
After that the whole pastic structure have weakened a lot, so is relativelly easy to remove the plastic "walls" and you can remove them by pulling from them laterally (after an small cut that needs some precission)... so no danger
And after that is needed to cut the metal layers in the center (patiently), when you cut the layer most at top there are other metal layers at bottom protecting the motherboard... so again no danger
The critical point is removing the last metal layer and the metal "frame" of the tokin :D

But at that point there is a lot of material that has been removed (that it was creating small air chambers that was preventing it to heat), so removing it at this point with hot air is going to be a lot easyer, and there are other means
 
Hiya, with a multimeter you can't. You could with an oscilloscope. Also while the NECs are soldered to the board you can't measure them like you could normally with a multimeter, because they are part of the circuit.

However, you could try what esc0rtd3w did (from page 106 - see quote below, and view the photos / attachments) - where you solder 2 x wires to the (+) and (-) legs of one NEC, on the RSX, that go to a set of external capacitors {of your choice, but say 2 x 2200uF - 6.3V}.

If your board is COK-01, COK-02, SEM-01, then there is enough space to solder. But not for board revisions that come after, for those boards a person would have to scratch the surface to solder on the (+) and (-) of the NEC.

You could test like this maybe...

Hi again..thank you so much for your answer..i read that post but there was not any photo from which NEC CAPACITOR should be solder to which Wire..
which one of that NEC is for RSX?
and there was not a visible photo of which capacitor should replace..please tell me how many and which capacitor should replace?
near the cpu and RSX there is 4 each capacitor and should i replace these?
and other side of motherboard there is 4 each NEC..should replace these?
 
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lol, well, i could but i already took off all of my NECs, i do have another PS3 that i'm working on soon, if i replace the NECs on that one i could aim to make some kind of tutorial, but i think you would have done the work yourself already before then.

You can do it any way you like, the black plastic is very thin and easy to come off, once removed you can see what was under the black plastic and you will see a way to get the rest to come up.

Or do a search on Youtube, for "NEC/Tokin removal" or "Removing NEC/Tokin" and watch how a few people do it, and get an idea what would suit you best. For me, i didn't want to use heat there, because melting plastic fumes would stink out my room lol, and i found it's pretty easy with a stanley knife, just take your time and go slow, checking each bit.

ok i do my best and tall you about teh resolute
 
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