ballistix keeps failing

[MadMan007]

My question is though what's so different about Ballistix? Lots of modules use the same ICs with the same voltage and timings. Is the TIM or heatspreader contact really that much worse? I know one set of DDR2-800 I had from another company didn't make full contact on all the chips either.

 

[Blkout]

My question is though what's so different about Ballistix? Lots of modules use the same ICs with the same voltage and timings. Is the TIM or heatspreader contact really that much worse? I know one set of DDR2-800 I had from another company didn't make full contact on all the chips either.

That's certainly a very good question since lots of brands use the same or similiar IC's made by Micron. But all I can say from my own experience with Ballistix is that they overclock like crazy when you first install them and then they usually start failing within a few months to a year afterwards. I've never had a single stick of Corsair or G.Skill memory fail me, no matter how high I was able to overclock them, but I can't say the same with two different sets of Ballistix I had.

Their reputation for failure is quickly becoming well known on most major forums. People that still buy them claim they have a good set and hasn't failed them, but I'm betting a few months later or even a year later, they won't be praising their set of Ballistix after they start failing.

 

[Blkout]

I have two sets of ballistix, no problems with them. I have one more set coming to me, hopefully these are good too.

I'm certainly not bashing your decision, but I will wish you luck. I'm sure every now and then someone gets a set of Ballistix that doesn't everntually fail, but the failure rate of Ballistix is alarmingly high which is very worrying.

 

[MadMan007]

One thing to remember is we lack information to really figure out the rate of failure. We don't know how many people have them or how many are sold versus how many fail. If something is very popular and sold more even with the same percentage of defects it will have more failures in absolute numbers. Ballistix are pretty popular especially with all the hot deals they had for so long.

 

[Maverick0984]

I know on these forums, (I can't speak for others) there are a large majority that purchased Ballistix sticks of RAM because they had been the sets everyone was recommending for a while. Given that information, it is statistically expected to see more threads started about them failing. Take the example below for instance:

100 Sets of Ballistix
20 Sets of G.Skill
20 Sets of Corsair
20 Sets of anything else really for this example.

Now say all brands fail at a rate of 10%. The Ballistix will see 5x the number of occurrences of failure, however, this isn't indicative of their failure rate at all, which is still on par with the others. Obviously, this is purely hypothetical as I have no information about this just like noone else here does. It is just important to point out that it is really hard to make such a bold blanket statement given the lack of information any of us actually has, regardless of our own personal experiences or those of "friends", "colleagues", or the like.

 

[freeagent]

i have ocz, crucial and gskill. all of them have micron d9gmh chips expet the gskills. my hz's live, the rest are dead. the gskills have d9gct, at least this particular set.. d9gmh is designed to die i think lol, i have no idea why, but nearly everyone with dead ram has d9gmh.

 

[Blkout]

I know on these forums, (I can't speak for others) there are a large majority that purchased Ballistix sticks of RAM because they had been the sets everyone was recommending for a while. Given that information, it is statistically expected to see more threads started about them failing. Take the example below for instance:

100 Sets of Ballistix
20 Sets of G.Skill
20 Sets of Corsair
20 Sets of anything else really for this example.

Now say all brands fail at a rate of 10%. The Ballistix will see 5x the number of occurrences of failure, however, this isn't indicative of their failure rate at all, which is still on par with the others. Obviously, this is purely hypothetical as I have no information about this just like noone else here does. It is just important to point out that it is really hard to make such a bold blanket statement given the lack of information any of us actually has, regardless of our own personal experiences or those of "friends", "colleagues", or the like.

Nice theory, but you have no facts to back up that claim and in my opinion, the excessive Ballistix failures are not simply because more people buy them. I've owned memory from most of the major manufacturers and the ONLY sets that ever failed me were two different sets of Ballistix.

Are you a spokesman for the Xbox 360 hardware division? Sounds like the same kind of spin...

 

[Maverick0984]

Nice theory, but you have no facts to back up that claim and in my opinion, the excessive Ballistix failures are not simply because more people buy them. I've owned memory from most of the major manufacturers and the ONLY sets that ever failed me were two different sets of Ballistix.

Are you a spokesman for the Xbox 360 hardware division? Sounds like the same kind of spin...

And you have no facts to back up what you are saying, which is exactly what you are saying it is, an opinion. No matter how many sticks you have personally seen or heard of, that in no way represents any sizable amount of sticks that go in and out of hands worldwide. Unless you've personally witnessed 100,000 sticks go bad, any sample size you think might be substantial, simply is not.

There is absolutely no spin involved here, it is simple statistics and reasoning. If anything, failure rates and odds support my claim more than yours.

People have bad experiences with certain brands all the time, you ask 10 random people on these forums 5 will hate Asus and those same will love Gigabyte, the other 5 will hate Gigabyte and love Asus, all for their own experiences which they blindly blanket the entire brand for. It is just part of the territory. You just happen to be one of those that hates Crucial because of your own personal reasons. You aren't the only person on the forums here that feel that way, but I'll assure you there are plenty that love their Ballistix sticks of RAM. There is a an old saying in the consumer industry saying something to the effect of "you never hear thanks, for when things work like they should." Should we be required to thank them? Of course not, but it still stands to reason why all the threads are negative, who is going to start a thread saying "OMG EVERYTHING WORKED, BAI."

 

[Blkout]

And you have no facts to back up what you are saying, which is exactly what you are saying it is, an opinion. No matter how many sticks you have personally seen or heard of, that in no way represents any sizable amount of sticks that go in and out of hands worldwide. Unless you've personally witnessed 100,000 sticks go bad, any sample size you think might be substantial, simply is not.

There is absolutely no spin involved here, it is simple statistics and reasoning. If anything, failure rates and odds support my claim more than yours.

People have bad experiences with certain brands all the time, you ask 10 random people on these forums 5 will hate Asus and those same will love Gigabyte, the other 5 will hate Gigabyte and love Asus, all for their own experiences which they blindly blanket the entire brand for. It is just part of the territory. You just happen to be one of those that hates Crucial because of your own personal reasons. You aren't the only person on the forums here that feel that way, but I'll assure you there are plenty that love their Ballistix sticks of RAM. There is a an old saying in the consumer industry saying something to the effect of "you never hear thanks, for when things work like they should." Should we be required to thank them? Of course not, but it still stands to reason why all the threads are negative, who is going to start a thread saying "OMG EVERYTHING WORKED, BAI."

You sure got offended quickly. Do you work for Crucial? I don't need to bash them, their products are doing a fine job of ruining their reputation by themselves. And "my own personal reasons" are that two different sets failed within 3 months of use. Sorry, but that's a 100% defect rate according to my sample. Be thankful you have a set that's working AT THIS MOMENT, but when they do fail, and they WILL fail. You'll understand why people won't buy them once bitten.

 

[Maverick0984]

You sure got offended quickly. Do you work for Crucial? I don't need to bash them, their products are doing a fine job of ruining their reputation by themselves. And "my own personal reasons" are that two different sets failed within 3 months of use. Sorry, but that's a 100% defect rate according to my sample. Be thankful you have a set that's working AT THIS MOMENT, but when they do fail, and they WILL fail. You'll understand why people won't buy them once bitten.

I didn't get offended, but I've been watching you around the forums lately, and most of your posts come with a solid dose of condescending tone to them. I find it pretty funny that you think your personal experiences reflect what everyone *will* soon experience, as you so put it. As if your experiences in this field are undoubtedly more worldly than everyone else's. Guess we should all believe the Newegg reviews then for all the products they sell. Seeing as how that small uninformed sample size, obviously reflects the masses.

 

[Interpol]

You sure got offended quickly. Do you work for Crucial? I don't need to bash them, their products are doing a fine job of ruining their reputation by themselves. And "my own personal reasons" are that two different sets failed within 3 months of use. Sorry, but that's a 100% defect rate according to my sample. Be thankful you have a set that's working AT THIS MOMENT, but when they do fail, and they WILL fail. You'll understand why people won't buy them once bitten.

Hmm...a sample size of 2 yields a p-value of what, 1.0? Hardly statistically significant. If you don't know what a p-value is, then you have no business bashing statistics that are being thrown in your face.

You sound like one of those people who flip a coin twice, get heads both times, and automatically conclude that flipping a coin will yield heads 100% of the time. Not only that, but you'd automatically accuse anyone who disagrees with you of working for the US Treasury.

 

[TheFrag]

I know on these forums, (I can't speak for others) there are a large majority that purchased Ballistix sticks of RAM because they had been the sets everyone was recommending for a while. Given that information, it is statistically expected to see more threads started about them failing. Take the example below for instance:

100 Sets of Ballistix
20 Sets of G.Skill
20 Sets of Corsair
20 Sets of anything else really for this example.

Now say all brands fail at a rate of 10%. The Ballistix will see 5x the number of occurrences of failure, however, this isn't indicative of their failure rate at all, which is still on par with the others. Obviously, this is purely hypothetical as I have no information about this just like noone else here does. It is just important to point out that it is really hard to make such a bold blanket statement given the lack of information any of us actually has, regardless of our own personal experiences or those of "friends", "colleagues", or the like.

Exactly. It is so wierd how no one ever factors this kind of thing in.

 

[Blkout]

I didn't get offended, but I've been watching you around the forums lately, and most of your posts come with a solid dose of condescending tone to them. I find it pretty funny that you think your personal experiences reflect what everyone *will* soon experience, as you so put it. As if your experiences in this field are undoubtedly more worldly than everyone else's. Guess we should all believe the Newegg reviews then for all the products they sell. Seeing as how that small uninformed sample size, obviously reflects the masses.

Uh, ok whatever...

 

[Blkout]

Exactly. It is so wierd how no one ever factors this kind of thing in.

It's not that no one factors this in, it's the fact that post after post keep coming up about Ballistix failure, and it's not just one set, many people are getting their original set RMA'd and they fail again shortly after. The fact is, if the product were reliable, regardless of how many sets you sale, negative reports wouldn't be all over the internet. I'm sorry but, I just don't buy into the buy more, fail more theory. People post good things about memory just as much as bad, that's what these forums are for, to educate people about what's good and what's not. The bad reports FAR outweigh the good reorts on Ballistix. It seems the only people that defend them are those that were lucky enough to get a set that hasn't died...yet.

 

[Blkout]

Hmm...a sample size of 2 yields a p-value of what, 1.0? Hardly statistically significant. If you don't know what a p-value is, then you have no business bashing statistics that are being thrown in your face.

You sound like one of those people who flip a coin twice, get heads both times, and automatically conclude that flipping a coin will yield heads 100% of the time. Not only that, but you'd automatically accuse anyone who disagrees with you of working for the US Treasury.

Bud, I don't care who you are, if you buy two different sets of memory and they both fail from the same manufacturer, then you choose another manufacturers memory and have no more faliures using the EXACT same setup, that's indicative of a faulty product, regardless of your sample rate.

What does the US Treasury have to do with this conversation other than your poor attempt to make a joke that wasn't funny?

 

[Blkout]

And before any of you geniuses choose to reply again about the "skewed" Ballistix failures, I'm done with this thread so feel free to post away about the "reliability" of Ballistix. It's not going to change all the negative posts about this memory on the forums so have at it. Whatever helps you sleep at night...

 

[maxfly]

Uh, ok whatever...

It's not that no one factors this in, it's the fact that post after post keep coming up about Ballistix failure, and it's not just one set, many people are getting their original set RMA'd and they fail again shortly after. The fact is, if the product were reliable, regardless of how many sets you sale, negative reports wouldn't be all over the internet. I'm sorry but, I just don't buy into the buy more, fail more theory. People post good things about memory just as much as bad, that's what these forums are for, to educate people about what's good and what's not. The bad reports FAR outweigh the good reorts on Ballistix. It seems the only people that defend them are those that were lucky enough to get a set that hasn't died...yet.

Bud, I don't care who you are, if you buy two different sets of memory and they both fail from the same manufacturer, then you choose another manufacturers memory and have no more faliures using the EXACT same setup, that's indicative of a faulty product, regardless of your sample rate.

What does the US Treasury have to do with this conversation other than your poor attempt to make a joke that wasn't funny?

And before any of you geniuses choose to reply again about the "skewed" Ballistix failures, I'm done with this thread so feel free to post away about the "reliability" of Ballistix. It's not going to change all the negative posts about this memory on the forums so have at it. Whatever helps you sleep at night...

it really is possible to fit those FOUR replys into one...

anyhow,this subject has been pounded into the ground here.i dont see anyone agreeing in the end.

 

[athlonhead]

When I got my OCZ ram last year I had the first two sets fail on me immediatly. At the time every one was saying OCZ was the best. Then they upgraded me to the ram I have now and the first set was bad out of the box too.

The next set has been fine and it has been over a year. I guess that they had a bad batch like what is happening to Ballistix now.

After that I have switched back to corsair. Sometimes it is just what you have good luck or bad luck with parts.

 

[||Console||]

My second set of 2x1gig died today . And im sure that when it gets back from rma it will have the slower single sided sitcks like my first . so now I will have no ram that does 500 @ 4-4-4-12 .

 

[Maverick0984]

Bud, I don't care who you are, if you buy two different sets of memory and they both fail from the same manufacturer, then you choose another manufacturers memory and have no more faliures using the EXACT same setup, that's indicative of a faulty product, regardless of your sample rate.

What does the US Treasury have to do with this conversation other than your poor attempt to make a joke that wasn't funny?

He was poking fun of your attempt at a joke earlier in the thread, in saying I might work for the 360 team w/ Microsoft or for Crucial.

I really don't see how his comment is any different than yours. Pot calling the kettle black much?

Like mentioned earlier, instead of posting 4 times, put it in 1.

It's not that no one factors this in, it's the fact that post after post keep coming up about Ballistix failure, and it's not just one set, many people are getting their original set RMA'd and they fail again shortly after. The fact is, if the product were reliable, regardless of how many sets you sale, negative reports wouldn't be all over the internet. I'm sorry but, I just don't buy into the buy more, fail more theory. People post good things about memory just as much as bad, that's what these forums are for, to educate people about what's good and what's not. The bad reports FAR outweigh the good reorts on Ballistix. It seems the only people that defend them are those that were lucky enough to get a set that hasn't died...yet.

There is a an old saying in the consumer industry saying something to the effect of "you never hear thanks, for when things work like they should." Should we be required to thank them? Of course not, but it still stands to reason why all the threads are negative, who is going to start a thread saying "OMG EVERYTHING WORKED, BAI."

Blue = utterly false.
Red = See quote.

Simply put, your sample size of 2, is insignificant. You cannot accurately judge another person's experience because you don't know what caused their sticks to fail. Much of the failed sticks I've ran into have been due in part to poor cooling, and not the sticks themselves. You seem to be dismissing my arguments because you "don't agree" with them and that is basically it, while providing no actual reasonable statement other than "I've seen lots of threads."