Does not look like Panasonic Caps too me.

All Low ESR Caps i ordered are Colored, not B/W.

Where did you purchase them ? i usually go for a Quality Dealer here.

Well, that was my first thought too, but then I checked the official spec sheet for EEUFR0J102 and... they are in fact B/W.
So... very strange.

I bought them from TME.eu, and my experience with them has been extremely good so far.

Actually the Panasonic FR series do look like that, I bought some from Digi-Key a while back and they look identical to yours. That doesn't rule out the possibility of those being fakes, but they look legit to me.

Regarding the cap that bulged, are you sure the polarity is correct? I know you installed it with the negative on the white mark in the PCB (which is usually the correct way), but there also seems to be a '+' sign on that side so maybe it's mislabelled? Also some manufacturers (such as ASUS) like being funny and use the white mark in the PCB for the positive.

can't help but wonder if the silkscreen of the caps wasn't messed up and due to that the bulging cap is reverse polarized.

TheMobRules wrote on 2021-06-25, 15:45:

Actually the Panasonic FR series do look like that, I bought some from Digi-Key a while back and they look identical to yours. That doesn't rule out the possibility of those being fakes, but they look legit to me.

Regarding the cap that bulged, are you sure the polarity is correct? I know you installed it with the negative on the white mark in the PCB (which is usually the correct way), but there also seems to be a '+' sign on that side so maybe it's mislabelled? Also some manufacturers (such as ASUS) like being funny and use the white mark in the PCB for the positive.

No, the polarity is correct (there is another smaller "+" sign inside the silkscreened square), I am always extra careful with this. Also checked with a multimeter just now and "-" goes to ground as it should .Anyway, here's a similar card on eBay, the cap is in the same position.

weedeewee wrote on 2021-06-25, 16:01:

can't help but wonder if the silkscreen of the caps wasn't messed up and due to that the bulging cap is reverse polarized.

Unlikely, the long leg was at the positive side...

Maybe the capacitor needed to be higher voltage in that spot ? Or perhaps ripple current rating was being exceeded

Tiido wrote on 2021-06-25, 16:39:

Maybe the capacitor needed to be higher voltage in that spot ? Or perhaps ripple current rating was being exceeded

No, all nine original caps were 1000 uF / 6.3V.
Regarding ripple current, I'm not excluding this possibility, but it's very unlikely that some cheapo Teapo 20-year-old caps had better ripple current tolerance compared to the modern Panasonic FR caps.

Anyway, I've since replaced the bad cap with another Panasonic FR 1000uF/6.3V from the same lot, and the board has been running a 3DMark 2001 loop for the past hour or so. I'm happy to report that there's no bulging yet, so it does look like that one cap was a dud. I'm still debating whether to re-replace them with other caps or not... I don't really trust them anymore 😀.

My guess is, that only one was bad.

TME does not sell fakes btw , they are a reputable retailer just in case anyone is wondering about that

bloodem wrote on 2021-06-25, 16:10:

weedeewee wrote on 2021-06-25, 16:01:

can't help but wonder if the silkscreen of the caps wasn't messed up and due to that the bulging cap is reverse polarized.

Unlikely, the long leg was at the positive side...

I was insinuating that the silkscreen on the board is wrong, and given that info you placed the cap on the board in the what seemed to you as the right orientation but due to the wrong silkscreen is in fact the wrong orientation.
Easily checked with a multimeter set to continuity.

edit: I just read you already did that. dangit. So let's stick with dud capacitor.

W.x. wrote on 2021-06-25, 17:01:

My guess is, that only one was bad.

Yeah, it looks like this was the case.

keropi wrote on 2021-06-25, 17:08:

TME does not sell fakes btw , they are a reputable retailer just in case anyone is wondering about that

Yes, I can attest to that. I've always had very good experience with them.

weedeewee wrote on 2021-06-25, 17:22:

I was insinuating that the silkscreen on the board is wrong, and given that info you placed the cap on the board in the what seemed to you as the right orientation but due to the wrong silkscreen is in fact the wrong orientation.
Easily checked with a multimeter set to continuity.

edit: I just read you already did that. dangit. So let's stick with dud capacitor.

Oh, I see. I thought you were talking about the silkscreening on the cap itself. 😀 But, yeah, there's no question about it: the polarity is correct.
Anyway, the card has been running 3DMark2001 in a loop for almost 3 hours, and so far all looks good, no bulging caps (+ it works perfectly beyond Ti 500 speeds - yay!). I will continue using it in the following days too, just to make sure there are no more surprises. 😀

UPDATE:

Have been stressing the card for more than a week now, it worked perfectly (and no more bulging going on). So it was in fact a DOA cap 😀
The card is rock solid at Ti 500+ clocks: 240 MHz core / 260(520) MHz memory.