What are the chances of bad ram, twice!

[Moppie]

I thought I would do the nice thing and use some of my redundancy pay out to buy my better half a new PC for Christmas.

I bought all the parts for a nice low end quad core with a couple gig of ram and nice video card for her gaming (turns out the latest expansion for WoW is quite graphics hungry).

I put it all together, it posted, loaded Bios, changed boot settings and it never booted again.

Back to the shop I got the bits from, and we replace the mother board.

Get it home, boot it up, install OS, realise never put in second RAM stick.
Install it, and, doesn't even post.
Remove second ram stick and computer runs again.

So, back to the shop and replace the matched pair of RAM.

Get it home, install it, and.....

Computer runs, then random errors and crashes occur.

Remove one ram stick and problems go away.

Run memtest on one stick, and it is good.

Run it on the other stick and it starts flashing errors before it has even tested 1%.

So that is 1 bad M/B, and 2 packs of bad ram.



Surly the odds of that happening have to be incredibly small, so small I doubt you could ever figure out. >:(>:(

[cueball]

You are one of the luckiest people in the world!!!bw!Seriously though I would be through the roof Pi$$ed off. I hope you get everything working man.

[Sean]

Have you tried different slots? That will rule out the motherboard. IT is possible if you bought the same brand from the same store. Might be a bad batch number.

What brand, and did you buy a KIT (two sticks in one package).

[OdiN1701]

What brand motherboard/RAM?

[MaxxuM]

I thought I would do the nice thing and use some of my redundancy pay out to buy my better half a new PC for Christmas.

I bought all the parts for a nice low end quad core with a couple gig of ram and nice video card for her gaming (turns out the latest expansion for WoW is quite graphics hungry).

I put it all together, it posted, loaded Bios, changed boot settings and it never booted again.

Back to the shop I got the bits from, and we replace the mother board.

Get it home, boot it up, install OS, realise never put in second RAM stick.
Install it, and, doesn't even post.
Remove second ram stick and computer runs again.

So, back to the shop and replace the matched pair of RAM.

Get it home, install it, and.....

Computer runs, then random errors and crashes occur.

Remove one ram stick and problems go away.

Run memtest on one stick, and it is good.

Run it on the other stick and it starts flashing errors before it has even tested 1%.

So that is 1 bad M/B, and 2 packs of bad ram.



Surly the odds of that happening have to be incredibly small, so small I doubt you could ever figure out. >:(>:(

It happens more often than I would like to think. Do plenty of hard testing of the hardware before you start to depend on it.

[HankScorpio]

You are grounding yourself before touching the RAM right? I can't count the number of sticks I've killed with static due to laziness......... no actually I can, it's 4.

[Moppie]

Corsiar RAM, and an Asus board, but a very simple version of the P5K with only 2 ram slots, so testing to find the bad stick is easy.
1 good stick works perfectly in either slot, the other stick fails in either slot.

I've certianly been ground myself, that is not the problem.


They are matched pairs, and from the same shop, so it is quite likley there is a bad batch.
I need to buy some more new stuff this afternoon, so I will go and talk to the sales guy about it, instead of returns (where there is a bit of a language barrier).
He can hopefully grab some from a different batch, or get a different brand.

[neil_g]

very odd.

mind you i can honestly say that ive never used a grounding strap and ive never fried anything with static. but then i dont wear nylon or run around on carpet in just my socks before building a computer.

last computer i built i did it on my bed covers for petes sake lol

[Bobster]

You are grounding yourself before touching the RAM right? I can't count the number of sticks I've killed with static due to laziness......... no actually I can, it's 4.
you're nickname must be Electro!
http://www.marvel.com/universe3zx/images/thumb/e/ee/Electrocloseup.jpg/440px-Electrocloseup.jpg
electronics are pretty robust when it comes to static..

i do however usually ground myself by touching a radiator before i build stuff..

[joedlh]

Are you using the same power supply that you had with the pre-quad core CPU? It might not be up to the power requirements of the new chip. Additional RAM might put it over the edge.

[tim]

Are you using an anti static strap? Or are you running around with RAM in your hand on wool carpet wearing nylon socks?!

[neil_g]

Are you using an anti static strap? Or are you running around with RAM in your hand on wool carpet wearing nylon socks?!

what'd i say.. :p

[HankScorpio]

electronics are pretty robust when it comes to static..
Not RAM, it's fragile stuff, doesn't like being dropped onto carpet either (stick 5).

[neil_g]

Not RAM, it's fragile stuff, doesn't like being dropped onto carpet either (stick 5).

:confused:

i chucked my 2 sticks on the bed the other night, they still work.. :p

what make you using, i wont buy any! j/k

[Moppie]

Are you using the same power supply that you had with the pre-quad core CPU? It might not be up to the power requirements of the new chip. Additional RAM might put it over the edge.

New PS, tested that when the board replaced.




I have been wearing lots of nylon lately though, and I did transport the ram sticks home in nylon stockings, and made sure I was rubbing myself on the carpet when I installed them.

[joedlh]

It's not a question of whether it's new or not. What's the wattage output? If the output can't support the power requirements, you'll see the kinds of problems you're seeing.

[Moppie]

:confused:

i chucked my 2 sticks on the bed the other night, they still work.. :p




That might be getting a little to intimate there Neil :p




It's not a question of whether it's new or not. What's the wattage output? If the output can't support the power requirements, you'll see the kinds of problems you're seeing.


Do you think a new 550W cooler master might be enough?
It's only got to drive an XFX 9600GT, a Q8200 on a P5KPL-CM, an LG DVD R/W, 2 x 1 GB of Corsair XMS2 ram and a single Seagate 250GB Sata HDD.

Of course if you had read my posts you would have noticed that I did rule out the power supply twice, once when it was tested by the supplier, and again by using only one RAM stick at a time ;)





All that said, it appears that wearing an extra layer of nylons has helped, and the 3rd matched pair now seems to be working.
Memtest didn't find any errors after 5 runs though. :cool::cool:

[Bobster]

Not RAM, it's fragile stuff, doesn't like being dropped onto carpet either (stick 5).
got to something wrong with you then, i've miss treated ram in the past, it was stuck in a pot for a couple of months, it worked without error..

[BeritOlam]

Have you tried running a big magnet up and down the stick about 100x each?

That'll definitely solve your problem!!

;) ;) ;) ;)

[neil_g]

sorry moppie, sometimes i just like to lay amoungst computer parts.. :p

Have you tried running a big magnet up and down the stick about 100x each?

That'll definitely solve your problem!!

???

are you thinking of magnets and hard disks?