HD100 power supply repair

[brb84]

Well, my one and only HD100 finally died yesterday as well...about 13 months of use. I remember reading the first posts about this issue around 6 months ago, and I was just hoping I'd be one of the lucky ones. Guess not.

Anyway, thanks to everyone for the effort in figuring out what the problem was and documenting how to fix it. I'm gonna go out and get some capacitors and see how I fare.

[Fluffdaddy]

I don't think there are going to be any "lucky ones". My guess is all of the 100's will fail with this cap problem.

Luckily it's a pretty ez fix

[brb84]

Woo! Got mine fixed. It took right at an hour from removing the first screw to tightening the last one. And I've never actually desoldered anything before. Had planned on using a desoldering tool, but all I had around was a wick, which I also had never used, but it wasn't too difficult.

Thanks again for posting the great instructions and pics. I'm incredibly happy spending an hour of work and $5 of parts and not having to bother with shipping it off and waiting to get it back.

[Swagger200]

I use this one less, with my downstairs system, have an HD-200 upstairs.

But it's been hot, so I went down and tried to turn the HD-100 on and, blinking power light of death.

I am not much for soldering so I guess I will be shipping it back for repair. Kind of bugs me since I had sent in an HD-100 before already - at least it was under warranty then.

Seems like Sage will eventually have to provide a more appealing and cheaper repair option - or perhaps a special upgrade price to the HD-200.

[inssain96]

After about 10 minutes of watching my HD100 last night poof...turned off, blinking red light, and slight hissing. Mine made it a whole 12 months and two weeks.

The fix seems easy enough, but this is BS...there should definitely be some sort of upgrade voucher or something. sigh...

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by inssain96

After about 10 minutes of watching my HD100 last night poof...turned off, blinking red light, and slight hissing. Mine made it a whole 12 months and two weeks.

The fix seems easy enough, but this is BS...there should definitely be some sort of upgrade voucher or something. sigh...

Overall I think they've done a decent job offering to repair the out of warranty units at what is most assuredly a net loss when you figure in person hours, etc.

When I think about the quantity of electronics that have quit on me over the years due to poor design, poor components, etc. I get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. In 99% of those cases if the unit was out of warranty then at BEST the company might send you a brochure of their current products for you to buy, but rarely if ever would they offer to repair the unit for anything close to a reasonable rate.

FYI, I have 2 HD 100's and the PS died on both of them. Oddly enough the one that was the oldest and got used probably 5x more than the other one lasted the longest.
Unit one bought in late December 2007 just died a couple weeks ago. This unit is my main extender on the Tv in the living room and gets used many hours every day.
Unit two bought in late February 2008 and it died a couple months ago. This unit is on the bedroom Tv and gets used at most an hour or two a night.

[cslatt]

Mine's down for the count, looks like it's time to stop by "The Shack" and warm up the soldering iron.

[MFULFORD]

After approx 12 months the most heavily used one of my 3 HD100s has failed (gone on the blink?). Have bought capacitors from Maplin to fix this one and ordered more to fix the others in the near future.

[larryf]

It's not just the HD100.

A friend gave me two Akai TVs that died on him one day apart with a blinking standby light.... and just a few weeks out of warranty. A quick search on google for 'Akai' and 'blinking' revealed Akai monitors and TVs have the same capacitor problem that we have seen on the HD100s. I just finished repairing one, almost all the caps were 1000u 35V and 1000u 16V. Most of them were bulging and discolored.

I'll bet there was a bad batch of caps made, and some of these ended up in the HD100s and Akai TVs and monitors.

There is a number stamped on all the caps I removed from the AKAI, C534... I assume this is a date code. I threw the caps away that I pulled from the HD100 so I don't know what those had on them. It would be interesting to find out if it was the same number or close to it.

Larry

Edited to say I found something on wikipedia... "Capacitor Plague"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague

Manufacturers used an incorrect electrolyte formula which caused the problem. Dell Computer is having serious issues with this right now.

[paulie]

My hd110 died last night. I got the caps 1000mf 35v from maplin this morning and it is back up and running. Thanks for the posts on repair it was a great help.

[jm987]

One of my HD100's was winning for a few days. Replaced the caps and all is fine now. Still have 2 HD100's going strong with the original caps

[Polycron]

Add me to the list. Came home, had the flashing red light. 2 of the 3 caps were bulged. I would have replaced all 3 but Radio Shack only had 2 in stock. I'll go back and upgrade the 1 good cap at some point in the future. Many thanks to all those that contributed to this thread. It took me longer to drive to Radio Shack then to fix the problem. I can't say how happy I am that it was only a simple cap replacement. No crowded boards, surface mount stuff, etc. Super easy. And I'm back to watching the Packer game!!!

[Gog]

My HD100 died last week, swolen caps. Looks like I have some soldering to do.

It was in service almost exactly two years. I bough it August 15, 2007.

Mathieu

[peternm22]

Originally Posted by Gog

It was in service almost exactly two years. I bough it August 15, 2007.

Wasn't it released in December 2007?

[Gog]

Originally Posted by peternm22

Wasn't it released in December 2007?

You're right, I looked at the wrong email, that was my hauppauge. The HD100 was ordered 12/10/2007

[simonen]

One of my HD100s just died. None of the tell tail sounds occurred, just a flashing red light and the unit will not turn on. Pulled the cover to find 2 bulged capacitors with a black substance coming out the tops.

Will fix it when I get the chance, not in a huge rush since I am evaluating a switch to media center 7 and xbox 360 extenders.

[gplasky]

Originally Posted by simonen

One of my HD100s just died. None of the tell tail sounds occurred, just a flashing red light and the unit will not turn on. Pulled the cover to find 2 bulged capacitors with a black substance coming out the tops.

Will fix it when I get the chance, not in a huge rush since I am evaluating a switch to media center 7 and xbox 360 extenders.

I thought this was interesting. Some people had thought the HD100 failure rate was a little on the high side. (Estimates were in the 1%-3% range.) This article xBox 360 failure rate. Game Informer survey's findings of a staggeringly high 54.2 percent failure rate for the xBox 360. And Microsoft doesn't dispute the data

Gerry

[simonen]

You are totally right! Not to mention they fix it for free within the first 3 years of purchase if I am not mistaken.

BTW, saying that I am evaluating certainly doesn't mean that I will do it. In fact, I should have not even mentioned it at all. To be honest, I feel that things are a bit slow on the 360 compared to the HD200. Anyways, we can leave this topic for another thread.

[taylormadearmy]

One of my 3 HD100s ordered in July 2008 just died. Capacitors ordered for all 3 or mine, 2 of my dad's and 3 of a friend's. I suspect they will all go eventually...

T

[MFULFORD]

I hope. One went down - the one used most. I thought I might as well do all 3 with the 35V caps recommended. Only one thought was that the OEM caps were 105 deg C and the replacement ones only 85 deg C. I just hope the new ones don't fail due to heat.