our Motu 828 mk3 that we used for years died some rather long time ago. After a few seconds the screen would just start blinking like it was switched on and off every second. I made a video of this
Since technology went on, searching for a replacement (we used that in the rehearsal room and live, at home I had also a mk2 unit), we decided to move on to thunderbolt technologie with a Presonus unit.
Still, it annoyed me that the thing was broken, and I searched the internet up&down to find a fix, though I couldn’t find one, just a hint in the commets of a youtube video:
This made totally sense, capacitors are the parts that die easily over time (it also was a big problem with other devices). Think about it like they have a given time span to live, and in the power section they reach is faster. So I took it apart, and checked the values of the capacitors to get new ones.
I then replaced all 6 of them, switched the unit on, and it’s now already running for hours without any problem 😉
A note on the soldering: The board is contacted on both sides, so the connection is either on the upper or lower side, check for that and make sure the connection is made correctly. I myself hate soldering those boards, because when you remove the old capacitor, there’s still solder in the hole and you can’t just push the new one through. I made it so that I heated on the lower side until I could push one leg through, then the next. Being lazy I didn’t push them until down to the board, so they stand a bit higher now 😉 Probably there’s a better way to solder double sided PCBs, but I don’t know it…
Obviously also make sure you take note where + /- goes, but if you are soldering in such a device, you probably know that.
I hope this helps anyone with the same problem