bad RAM?

[ninthebin]

Have you ever heard of a stick of RAM that although appears to work fine, will end up damaging the slot its in...this could be all coincedental btw...

I have 3 slots....and I had 128 in dimm3 for about a year, then I got another stick of 128, to my dismay dimm3 broke...so I put new RAM in dimm2 and old RAM in dimm1.

got a new gfx card yesterday put it in...now dimm1 is apparently dead, now this just seems a bit suspect to me that the same stick of RAM has once again ended up in a crippled dimm slot...

any ideas?

[Steelforge]

Dimm 3 broke in what way? The clamps? Which dimm is the new stick in?

[ninthebin]

broke as in notworking - no physical damage is apparent, just noting you put in them works...and the newer RAM is in Dimm2, thats always worked...

this dead dimm slot problem seems to follow the older RAM, as I say, could be a coincedence, could be something up with it - thats where you guys come in :)

[daleorama]

The only thing I can think of is maybe the chip is a bit too big for the DIMM. Do you have to struggle to get it in? Is your motherboard a PC Chips board? I know those boards can't handle the pressure of pressing a memory chip into the DIMMS, and the slots eventually stop working.

[macklin01]

Originally posted by daleorama
The only thing I can think of is maybe the chip is a bit too big for the DIMM. Do you have to struggle to get it in? Is your motherboard a PC Chips board? I know those boards can't handle the pressure of pressing a memory chip into the DIMMS, and the slots eventually stop working.
Dale, welcome to the forums, adn thanks for the interesting post--I had never heard that before!

Another possibility is that the board was past it max amount of RAM, although I doubt it, from the description. (I mean this more for when it didn't recognize RAM in teh third slot.)

Did you try reversing the posisitions of the first and second sticks? One alone?

I suppose it would also be possible for a surge associated with the death throes of a stick of RAM could damage some of the nearby components, such as a voltage regulator or capacitor.

You might want to try each stick individually in the second slot. Run memtest86 on each individual stick if you can post. I should detect any errors in the RAM.

Good luck! -- Paul

[ninthebin]

definetly not maxed out :)

but...could it be that the old stick was crappy and was on its way out...and works when it wants to, or is RAM gone for good when its gone?

im gonna be messing around with it on saturday, but I wanna know whether to persist trying to get the ram working, or if I hsould just get new stuff :)

[macklin01]

Originally posted by ninthebin
definetly not maxed out :)
:) I didn't figure so ...

but...could it be that the old stick was crappy and was on its way out...and works when it wants to, or is RAM gone for good when its gone?
That's a very good question, and I'm afraid I don't have an answer to it. However, even if RAM is occasionally good and occaisonally bad, RAM errors are very serious things. (For example, you're working on a big term paper, it's all in RAM, and there's a RAM error as you try to save it.) If you're sure the RAM is giving even occasional errors, I'd recommend getting new RAM.

Good luck! -- Paul

im gonna be messing around with it on saturday, but I wanna know whether to persist trying to get the ram working, or if I hsould just get new stuff :)

[Da Whip]

This should have been posted in the Memory Forum.
Read the Forums protocol.
P.S. Welcome to the forums!!

[ninthebin]

I thought this was a "general hardware" section...

but then, I think im having a moan here, does this mean It also has to be moved to the gripes and moans section?

and im sure I mentioned the word gfx card in my original post...does that mean it also has to be put in the video cards :S

(not meant as personal attack on you da whip ;) )

[Da Whip]

Not taken as a personal affront.

But it seemed the majority of the post was about a memory issue.

There are lots of new members and if you don't lead by example, there will be discussions about video cards in the Cases and PSU forum. ( "Well it fits in the case and it needs power so,......)