Amateur electronics questions, but almost on-topic

I have a couple of questions that I haven't been able to find in my books. (1) there has been much discussion in this list about capacitors failing. I recently had a cap on a QIC-24 drive fail with a bit of sound and fury (axial tantalum). Is there any way to test for this other than desoldering every cap (at least every electrolytic) and testing it on a cap meter? I don't want to fry my IMSAI, but there are a lot of caps in there and it would take forever... (2) (flame risk) My Tek 555 popped and blew a fuse when I had it plugged in last. I disassembled the PS and cleaned off the dust, and I want to test it by itself, but the power-on relay won't close. Any hints, or is this like amplifiers where the tubes need a load? - Scott Quinn