Our Gripe with self diagnosis from reading forums

I read on a forum it’s a capacitor or something causing the issue…. I’ve read it’s a common problem lots of people have reported faults like this…..

In a day and age where information about anything ever created, is available 24/7 anywhere you are it is easy to be bombarded with views opinions and frankly rogue advice. Statistically it is easy to find many people who have had a similar or the same experience as you in just about anything.  As long as it’s mass produced either in manufacture or action, chances are a percentage of every possible combination issue could happen. 

With forum upon forum, Facebook and every other social platform where a keyboard warrior has a view that they perceive to be 100% accurate through a slice of single serving knowledge. From a whisper of what a mate said, or from another forum where it may have actually been generated from a knowledgeable person however due to lack of understanding elements were simplified, missed out ir simplified to fit the context of making it out like they know what they’re talking about we end up in this muddy murky waters of actually what is the fault? What steps have been made to identify the issue, external factors to cause the issue i.e. overheating, mechanical stress, genuine part failure. No none of that, I’m standing by my guns, I read on a forum it’s a capacitor or something causing the issue…. I’ve read it’s a common problem

The internet is a library full of vague sections with blank books in ready to be filled.

The problem is the internet because it is written in computerised text is believed to be the truth.  Remember the days of going into a library and taking out a book to educate yourself, it was written by a credible author, who had their work justified and deemed accurate and correct. 

A modern day ‘internet’ library – It’s full of blank books, in vague sections, much easier to find the exact word you’re after but just a bit loose.  Every time you take it out, you write a paragraph, you base it on why you got the book to start with, have a little skim read over previous entries, put your slant on it and write your epic battle like you’re the next Alexander Graham Bell.  Yeah thats right anybody can take this book out and write what the hell they want in it, hello modern world.

Ok ok so I’m reading this dribble obviously written by a a pretty pissed repair electronics guy who likely has no friends due to strong views and question that that’s not how the internet forums work and that it’s credible information… Umm yes well most people of the electronics guy’s nature here stays off these forums, we’ve tried to contribute however because we’re not bashing out nonsense every post tend to get ignored and bashed down by the true drivel talkers.

Capacitors

capacitors get all the bad press. Got a fault with an amp, could be a capacitor.  Car not working oh it could be a capacitor.  I think the reason Capacitors have been given a bad press is back from the days of old Valve amps.  A capacitor is essentially two bits of metal/ foil separated by a insulator known as a dielectric.  In older valve amps the idea was to isolate the high voltage from the signal, one side of the capacitor would have on average of 400-500V and the other side 0.2V  As you see that is quite a stressful place to be and stop so any breakdown is going to cause issues.  Older valve amps you would hear the pot get very scratchy sounding or a prominent undertone hum would be heard.  Unfortunately the ‘old school’ guitarists always jump to this being the first issue… 

Overheating Resistors

The number of times we get people ranting at us about how the resistors have got hot, and burnt the circuit board and it’s poor design and planning to make this happen… Yeah sorry to burst your bubble but resistors are designed to limit current.  How you ask? they pass through what is needed but need to get rid of the rest, how? Well it’s not a magical rendition entourage of the Greatest Showman, its plain simple heat.  The larger white ceramic and other such resistors are designed to dissipate excess current through heat. That is why they’re often mounted off the circuit board to permit flow of air around them.  Other ways include mounting them flush to the circuit board but providing a big copper track underside to act as a heatsink. Often their placement in the item is questionable where they could have been mounted elsewhere however overheating resistors are quite normal.  The pitfall can often be though that they get so hot they can actually unsolder themselves.