Tinker Mods Blog | Original Xbox

The Introduction

I wanted to add an introduction to this guide so everyone knows what is really being covered here. This is not a tutorial on how to remove the clock cap itself, but is a complete guide to the issue. After doing this for many years and opening thousands and thousands of original Xbox consoles, I've noticed there's a ton of information out there that simply isn't true. And that a lot of the info from the days of old has also been lost. I will debunk some myths as well as add practical information for the every day Xbox'er who is trying to learn about the original Xbox leaking clock cap, as well as experienced individuals who get the wrong information. So let's get this started and address what the issue is, as well as what is causing it.

What is actually happening?

The clock cap is an.... interesting... design choice made by Microsoft. The clock capacitor has a simple duty, store energy that will store the date and time info of the console. We won't get into myth or fact yet, so the first thing to understand is that this is a multi-layered issue. Microsoft used just about the crappiest capacitor it could possibly use for this purpose. There are actually motherboard revisions that use higher-end or higher-quality capacitors on the entire motherboard EXCEPT for the clock capacitor. However, another equal part of this problem is the process itself.

Using a capacitor to store "liquid" information (Information that changes or moves even if the console isn't being used) is not an unknown or rare thing. However in this day and age it was supposed to be a nice feature that made the original Xbox more modern and futuristic. It meant you could have your console completely unplugged and still be able to maintain the correct date and time. A small feature but none the less, a feature. The clock cap is also used as a bit of a back up to storing the info on the hard disk. (We will touch more on that later) The point of explaining this is that the process itself causes extra stress and use on a capacitor than a typical one. The clock cap stays charged at ALL times even if you have your original Xbox turned off! It needs the energy to both store the info as well as have the clock and calendar continue counting even when not in use. This was used in PCs and many other applications, but on the original Xbox it meant that capacitor remained charged at all times, even when the console is unplugged it maintains that charge as long as possible to keep the clock operation going. In general this is going to cause a lot more wear on a cap then one used for standard running operations.

So, putting both of those concepts together we can now see why the original Xbox leaking clock cap is such a common issue. In fact, At this point in time (2023) it would be nearly impossible for your original Xbox motherboard to NOT have a leaking clock cap. (Plenty of exceptions to this rule, make sure you read on to understand why) This was a long read of info, but knowing this is vital in helping to fix, diagnose, and understand the leaking clock cap on an original Xbox console.

Why is a leaking clock cap an issue?

Now let's address the obvious question you would have now. What problem does a leaking clock cap actually cause? The material inside a capacitor can be very volatile and corrosive. The clock cap doesn't malfunction as others. In most situations a capacitor "busts" or "pops" out of the top and spews its cooked insides everywhere. Sometimes leaving a heavy, strong smell of fish. However, the clock cap actually leaks from the bottom, and continues to function as it should while it leaks. A more common busted or popped cap would cease to function in any capacity. This means the clock cap will CONTINUE to leak forever. This leakage now spills onto the motherboard of your original Xbox console and starts corroding leads, and traces. Take a look at these two pictures, This first is a leaking clock cap before cleaning, the second is after.

As you can see, the thick brownish, tanish material you see in the first picture is actually clock cap leakage that has also been covered in dust over time. That material can corrode leads, if you notice, even after cleaning the clock cap some of the leads are not the common silver color, they are also brown and almost rusted looking in some areas. Those areas can be fixed simply enough by removing the old solder off the joint and adding more. However, the REAL problems you will encounter are actually caused by the corrosion to traces. Traces are the lines embedded into the motherboard that connect points together. Once those traces start to decay, the damage is permanent. That also means if the leakage isn't stopped or cleaned before causing real damage to the console, there is no going back. That damage and the problems it causes will be permanent. The only possible solution would be hand wiring a single wire to each trace origin and end point manually and by hand. This would circumvent the trace all together and use the wire to transfer the data/energy. This is a highly time consuming process and is something only highly skilled pros should look into attempting. For everyone else, it means the motherboard is now dead, and will only get worse as time and corrosion continue to decay more traces. Now that we know what the leaking clock cap actually does to your original Xbox, you probably have another question at this point.

What problems will you really see?

Knowing about the corrosion and damaged traces is good, but that still doesn't really tell you what happens. This is also the part of this article where I see a lot of wrong information being tossed around in hobbyist groups around the original Xbox. First, we need to establish the difference between something being damaged and broken. As soon as the clock cap starts leaking on your original Xbox motherboard, it causes damage. The chemicals instantly start to corrode traces and leads. So, It is a MYTH that a leaking clock cap automatically breaks the motherboard, and it is a MYTH that the motherboard isn't damaged yet by the leaking clock cap. Yes that capacitor is causing damage to your motherboard as soon as it leaks, but as long as you don't see the actual symptoms of bad traces, the console is still okay and the leakage can be cleaned and stopped from breaking the traces permanently. AND, if you realize you have a motherboard with a clock cap leaking, DO NOT throw the console or motherboard away!

The reason this is important is Anyone trying to sell you an original Xbox console or motherboard claiming there is NO damage from a leaking clock cap isn't being truthful. Unless the motherboard is a 1.6 or 1.6B revision (More on that later) there is almost zero chance there is no damage or corrosion at all. At this point in time, the only way that's possible is if someone has regularly cleaned (Every few months) the clock cap leakage or removed the clock cap entirely with-in a few months of it coming out of the factory. Some of these consoles started leaking mere months after they were built by Microsoft. The main reason this is important, It is OKAY, if the clock cap has started leaking on the motherboard as long as it hasn't actually broken it yet. So with that out of the way, here is what you will see once the damage is permanent and causing the console to malfunction;

The console's front power button will start to act possessed - Ever had an original Xbox that wouldn't turn on when you pushed the power button, but it would when you pushed the eject button? Ever had a console where you push the power button and it causes the disc tray to eject instead? Sometimes pushing the eject button opens the disc tray and turns the console off at the same time. This is ALL caused by broken traces that have been fully damaged and corroded by the leaking clock cap.
Controller ports malfunctioning - This is an odd one, as the controller ports can themselves malfunction and die or have a short in the wires that has NOTHING to do with the leaking clock cap. Here is a good way to be sure. Does controller port 1 work but not controller port 2? or vise versa? That would be a good sign you have trace damage instead of a bad controller port (BUT NOT ALWAYS!)
The console never turns off - This one is pretty similar to the first one. You will notice this issue when you plug an original Xbox console into the power cable and the console automatically turns on. Then when you hit the power button, either nothing happens at all, or it turns off and right back on. The only way to keep the console off is to un-plug it.
The Green and Red FRAG - This one is rare and also usually overlooked as the FRAG can happen for tons of reasons. The original Xbox FRAG is when the console will attempt to turn on three times, only to then have a green and red flashing light on the front power button. This is the ultimate of hardware failures as even the original Xbox error codes couldn't populate an error without hitting hardware failures. This can be caused by tons of issues but I have absolutely seen extensive and long term trace corrosion become so bad that the console will no longer even boot.

Once again you may find yourself asking yet another question after reading this information. What do you do about it?

Addressing and preventing the leaking clock cap

Now on to the fun part. What do you do about it? Well if you read the last section and your console is all ready showing signs like the ones listed above, then there isn't much you can do now. As mentioned above you could hand wire the trace to circumvent each broken trace. This would require you to identify every trace that has been broken, OR just re wire EVERY trace in the area of the clock cap. I myself have the ability to do this but rarely ever do. It is simply too time consuming to be worth it. Plus, who would be okay getting a replacement motherboard that has a ton of extra wires soldered on to it because it had bad trace damage? For most people you should simply look into finding a replacement motherboard. Just make sure you know what motherboard revision you have first so you don't also have to replace the power supply (Or even outer shell) If you don't know how to do that, I made a guide for that too, you can find That guide on how to find your original Xbox version by clicking here! After that you can start the hunt for a replacement motherboard like Any of these original Xbox motherboards.

If your console doesn't have any of those problems, then you are in luck! Follow these steps and prevent the console from breaking permanently;

Clean the leakage - This is vital and the most important thing you can do. It also requires no skill what-so-ever. The clock cap is located in the bottom left corner of the motherboard if you are looking at it top down with the front facing you. Use the pictures I added above for reference as well. It is actually very easy to know which cap is the clock cap if you aren't sure. The leakage spot will very clearly surround the cap evenly(ish) and the clock cap is the medium sized cap in that area. You will see some that are smaller in size and some much larger. The one that is kind of in between in size is the clock cap. I would add pictures to make it easier but every motherboard revision looks a little different and could get confusing. Use 70% rubbing alcohol (90% is even better) and throughly clean and scrub that entire area. Q-tips are great for this! Compressed air in a can or an air compressor can also help you blow whatever remnant of leakage off the board that was absorbed into the rubbing alcohol. Just make sure you scrub thoroughly before you do that. HOWEVER, You also need to be GENTLE while cleaning. There are some small surface mount components in this area and the corrosion caused by the leaking clock cap actually weakens the solder joints. If you scrub too hard you can literally wipe one of those tiny components right off the motherboard. A good tip for this, clean as best you can on the leads ONLY, try not to rub and scrape over the entire component while you clean.
Take care of the cap - This one is an issue I wanted to address, as there is a ton of false info about this process. Let me break it down quickly. You can remove the clock cap entirely by desoldering it, or if you have the proper clippers you can just cut the legs and remove it that way. HOWEVER, I would NEVER recommend this unless you plan on soft or hard modding the console. (More on that in the myth or fact section) Otherwise plan on replacing it with a matching clock cap. It would also be a good time to replace it with the highest quality cap you can buy, it isn't much more expensive to do so and they hold up way longer before leaking starts again.

Now that all the basics are covered I want to really dig into the important information you need to know. This will be the myth or fact section and my hope is to help stop the spread of all the completely useless and false information there is on the original Xbox leaking clock cap. So here we go!

Checking the myths and facts

I'll be honest, this section is the entire reason I wanted to write this article. As someone that sells and repairs parts as well as offers free info to help people out (Shameless plug for myself), it is insanely frustrating trying to get people to realize the info they had on the clock cap isn't true, or sometimes just isn't even necessary. So below is a section with the most common myths and facts that exist about the clock cap. Some of this info is from experience, and some of this is knowledge we use to use in the old days of modding original Xbox consoles. But all of these are things I am asked quite a bit. So here we go;

Can you pick me out a motherboard with no clock cap leakage, can you send pics of the clock cap area to see if there is any trace damage? This is such a tough question for me to answer because it feels like I'm stuck in a hard place. If you read this whole article, I've talked about there being no such thing as a motherboard that doesn't have SOME kind of damage. You could get lucky and happen upon one that was regularly maintained for the last 20+ years but we all know that is nearly impossible. If you are buying an original Xbox console or a replacement motherboard, there will be SOME kind of corrosion or damage caused by the leakage! Instead, ask questions that will determine if the leakage has caused any permanent damage. If not, you can easily clean and remove the clock cap. SCAM WARNING: If a seller EVER tells you there is no damage or corrosion from the clock cap they aren't being honest with you. A good seller is going to let you know there was some leakage but no permanent damage, or that they have replaced or cleaned the clock cap already, NOT try to make you think it didn't exist.
All original Xbox versions have a clock cap. This is false, I don't so much have people asking me or see people claiming that is the case. What I do have is people who are unaware that there were revisions of the motherboard with no clock cap. The motherboard revision 1.6 and 1.6b were updated by Microsoft. Those two revisions do not have a clock cap at all, and therefore a leaking clock cap is a NON-ISSUE for those. If you aren't sure, Check out this article to learn how to find your original Xbox version.
A leaking clock cap can be fixed. This is one of the ones that makes absolutely no sense. This is a statement that shows a complete lack of understanding both about what the issue really is and what to do about it. As stated above, once the clock cap starts leaking, the leakage causes damage. That damage is irreversible. There is no way to backtrack that. The best you can do is take the measures listed above to prevent and stop it from getting worse, BEFORE it causes damage to the traces that make the original Xbox un-usable.
You can remove the clock cap without replacing it. This one is true AND false. You can remove the clack cap without replacing it with a new one. The console will still function. However, this has a huge warning attached to it. I would NEVER tell someone to remove the clock cap without replacing it, unless they were also planning on soft or hard modding the original Xbox console as well. Here's why, There is a very odd error code on the original Xbox, the error 16. This error is not actually caused by the clock cap. BUT, the clock cap can PREVENT you from getting an error 16 if you have a stock, non-modified console. If you like, Check out this short article about the original Xbox error 16. This error code happens when something is changed, modified, deleted, or corrupted that deals with the clock information, and MORE specifically the little menu that pops up during boot up asking you to set the day and time. If that info is corrupted on the HDD, AND you don't have a working clock cap as a back up, then the console is bricked. After the error 16 the chance of fixing it is low. This issue is solved by soft or hard modding the console. Those mods change the way the clock and calendar are handled and becomes a non-issue. This is why you should only remove the clock cap and leave it off if you have a modified console. If you want to keep the console factory stock, make sure you replace the clock cap.
Replacing the clock cap is a permanent solution - VERY false. Remember what I said at the start of this article, a leaking clock cap on the original Xbox is a multi-layered issue. The issue isn't JUST a crappy capacitor used by Microsoft. Using a higher quality cap will help tremendously. It would be a lot longer until the cap has issues. But rememeber, the process of how the clock cap is used ALSO effects this problem. SO, eventually, that new clock cap will leak too. This applies to a modified console too. Even though the process isn't used, if a clock cap is present, eventually, it will start leaking just like any other. So do not replace your clock cap and assume it will be okay. Check it every few months for leakage, if there is some clean it again. if needed, replace the cap again too. You should not treat this like a one and done issue. Monitor it regularly, clean it regularly.

All told the original Xbox leaking clock cap is a complicated issue. My goal here was to collect all the info and put it in one place. Giving everyone a resource they can go to for information. Don't forget, If you still have questions let me know! Go the my Contact section here and fill out the form, I'll try and help any way I can.