Cointerra Terraminer Half Speed PSU/Board problem??

[-ck]

Can someone summarize the possible reasons and solutions to the "yellow light of death" problem?

Yellow light means there's a short somewhere. Only real solution is likely to be RMA.

[bitcoinbearhk]

RMA? 

[KOTEKPL]

Can someone summarize the possible reasons and solutions to the "yellow light of death" problem?

Yellow light means there's a short somewhere. Only real solution is likely to be RMA.

I emailed them asking for a new board. they said they don't sell parts.....    out of warranty because i opened the case to dust....... 
have to send the whole unit to TX. they will test it and if its the board it will cost  $1200  and about 3 weeks at least for a new one.....
needless to say.. NO THANKS!!

Just bought a whole perfectly working terraminer for 1800 of Craigslist.    At this point i will hold on to my "shorted" board til we are all 100% sure its not fixable. i bet its some stupid little component that goes out on all of ours that have no power / no fans / yellow / orange led on the power supply with the bad board.

[-ck]

Yellow light means there's a short somewhere. Only real solution is likely to be RMA.

RMA?  

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Return_merchandise_authorization

But if you've opened up your terraminer you have voided your warranty and they will refuse.

[bitcoinbearhk]

I noticed that some people are claiming to have fixed the problem by switching the power cables around:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=638180.0

But I am not absolutely sure if I should do this.  I scare that it will caught fire or burn the board some how.

[venom2049]

I tried to do that already but nothing worked. the actual board has no lights on it. if switch the cables it causes a short still nothing after that.

[abec]

I had the same problem and after troubleshooting and looking over the board, I found a blown capacitor ( I think its a capacitor at least ).

I have a ton of older bit coin hardware, and some upgrade kits for block erupter blades, but I obviously need to find the right capacitance.  Any ideas where I can get clarification?

http://abecx.net/bitcoin/cointerra.jpg

http://abecx.net/bitcoin/cointerra2.jpg

[adib]

1. Get your meter, measure to see if the capacitor is in shorts(it normaly wouldnt but its in a circuit and i cant tell).
2. Just remove it and try to power it on, one capacitor wont make the diffence.
if the removed/burnt capacitor conducts current it is most probably the one causing the faultt

[abec]

1. Get your meter, measure to see if the capacitor is in shorts(it normaly wouldnt but its in a circuit and i cant tell).
2. Just remove it and try to power it on, one capacitor wont make the diffence.
if the removed/burnt capacitor conducts current it is most probably the one causing the faultt

I took that capacitor off because I didnt realize that it had to be off the board to check capacitance.   23.61uF was the result.

I will try and power up the board with out it.  I thought that removing it would be enough as well, thanks for reenforcing that.

For what its worth, the bad cap was still conducting current across.

[abec]

Ok, still the same issue, its showing a bad ground ( I assume ).  The beagle one is plugged up to the same power supply and it works.  I've swapped out both power supplies, they both work on the good board.  I also swapped the power converter device ( whatever that thing is the plugs up to the power supply ), and same thing.

I am trying to find anymore obvious issues on the device.

I have a feeling the previous owner had really shitty power, and blew a few circuit breakers.  Any other tips to track down the issue?

I'm pretty sure the device was still under warranty, but I've opened it up and troubleshoot, I doublt Cointerra would work with me on it.

[abec]

Here are a copy of hi-res images, the first one you can see the damage ( well the clean up ) at the bottom, the second image you can see the two capacitors I took out @ C556.  Right now the power supply still comes on, just no power goes the board.  I checked with a voltage meter, and the board is not asking for power for whatever reason.

The power supply is still showing the yellow light.

I can't embed because the images are too large.

http://abecx.net/bitcoin/DSC_0224.jpg
http://abecx.net/bitcoin/DSC_0225.jpg

[adib]

Its worth trying to measure the resistance between each coil aka out to see if there is a short, i mean put one lead to ground and check each coil output.
Maybe the one having the least resistance or no resistance is busted.
You could have a busted coil also.

Hope this helps. If not, its just done.

[abec]

I assume the coils are the Pulse units.  I will check those and see.

[adib]

The coils are the big square grey things. Yes the pulse units.
See if they conduct current, they should, if they dont, they are busted for sure.

The thing is, even if they do, they could still be busted.
The coating inside, on the wires if it melts, it will still conduct current but it will act as a short not as a coil.

The ins and outs of static vs dynamic measurement

If you can find them cheap, replace them all. the are quite unrelable. A few puls coils went down on my bf hcards, sqeling.

[abec]

Thank you for your help, I have learned a lot and you have pointed me in the directions I need to learn more.

I am going to try and replace the power inductors and see if that gets the board working again.

PA2891.261HL  Is the part number, but its a pain in the ass to try and find these not in shipments of 4000+.

Do you have any idea what specialty shops I could find 16 of them without having to commit to a full shipment -_- 

I found the Pulse specs online, maybe I can find a comparable product somewhere else.

[abec]

Maybe this will help someone in the future, the capacitors are:   100 microfarad, 4 volt, size 1206; 20% tolerance.

http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/12065C104MAT2A/478-3353-1-ND/930145