linear cannonif you happen to have an old macintosh made before 1994 or so in storage somewhere, and you aren't sure if it has been recapped: you should go open it up (this is very easy for macintosh ii or quadra/centris machines, less so for classic macs), take out the battery, and find all the small silver cylindrical canisters and twist them off.
yes, really. grab a pair of pliers, and twist it in either direction until it pops off. you can leave the little black plastic underneath where it is. do not directly pull the canister, only twist. if you pull, you can break off the bit of metal that it connects to.
this will prevent them from doing any more damage than they already have, and later if you or someone else wants to get the machine working again they can just put new capacitors on and hopefully not need to repair damage to the motherboard itself.
if you do not do this, the battery and capacitors can burst open and leak all over the motherboard and cause damage that is very hard to repair. chances are, if you have such a computer, this is probably already happening, but you should still do this to prevent it from getting worse.
yes, really. grab a pair of pliers, and twist it in either direction until it pops off. you can leave the little black plastic underneath where it is. do not directly pull the canister, only twist. if you pull, you can break off the bit of metal that it connects to.
this will prevent them from doing any more damage than they already have, and later if you or someone else wants to get the machine working again they can just put new capacitors on and hopefully not need to repair damage to the motherboard itself.
if you do not do this, the battery and capacitors can burst open and leak all over the motherboard and cause damage that is very hard to repair. chances are, if you have such a computer, this is probably already happening, but you should still do this to prevent it from getting worse.
↑ TIM