I know it’s been some time since I’ve officially taken care of this problem, however I thought I’d go ahead and post of my dealings with bad capacitors. Both of my motherboards, the GA-7VAXP in my desktop PC, and the Epox 8KHA+ in my server, died within about a week of each-other, I assume due to bad capacitors 
. As you can see in the images, both had capacitors with bulged tops and leaks (The Epox having some of the worst).
My problems began one evening while my desktop was rendering a video for a DVD using Pinnacle Studio 9. About half way through the render, the machine hard locked and was making an audible noise (high pitched) from the motherboard. I cycled the power, only to boot into an incredibly unstable machine (in both Windows and Linux). So, I proceeded to diagnose the problem. First I double checked OS, because there had been a few odd problems that could point to a failing hard drive. Unfortunately that landed me no where closer to an answer as I was even getting kernel panics from Knoppix disks. I then found the answer to the problem after receiving multiple errors from a memtest86 scan (memory test). First I assumed bad memory until I received the exact same error message from the exact same memory location, no matter what memory configuration I had (swapped pieces, only one stick installed, and etc).
At this point I replaced that motherboard with an Epox 8RDA+ Pro (Nforce 2 chipset), returning my system back to normal. While I realize this is kind of an old motherboard and chipset, it allowed me to simply solve the problem at a very low cost (since our computer budget is incredibly slim at the moment). Actually, I’ve been quite happy with this motherboard so far, as it has even assisted in the slow upgrade of my desktop, thanks to the on-board SATA controller. Unfortunately I’ve not been able to get my server back up and running due to the power supply. I had an old Giga-byte GA-6BXC and an old Intel Pentium 3 (450mhz) processor, which would be more than enough for my Linux server, however the power supply was also mis-behaving, and the motherboard must have been it’s last straw (I can’t keep the power supply on for much more than a few seconds, even with a motherboard testing adapter).
On the note of the being able to upgrade my desktop, I was able to purchase a new hard drive for my desktop, getting away from the three hard drives that the system originally housed (giving me only a small 160gb – small when your trying to edit video, play games, and house music and photos). For this, I gave into the recommendations of friends, co-workers and reviews, and purchased a Western Digital WD2500KS (250gb, 7200RPM, 300mbps SATA HDD). I’ve been pretty impressed with the performance, and it’s now the quietest part in the system (minus the items that have no moving parts). Reliability of course will only be proven over time. Either way I’ve been pretty happy with the drive.
So that’s the latest on the desktop hardware front. Hopefully I’ll be able to post some on my latest dealings with linux soon, especially now that I work as a software engineer in a linux environment.
Then again, since I’m just an average guy just talking about random things, I’ll probably never have much growth potential 
