Iv had my current PC for coming up 2 years now and its served me very well. It is of high enough spec to serve me well into the future with only minnor upgrades, I built it with longevity in mind.
EXCEPT,
In November last year I ripped its guts out and put them in a new case with more drive bays so I would have room for extra HDDs, DVD-R etc.
Then sometime between then and now it started to behave a little funny, was a lot slower than it used to be.
Well last week I worked out it was only booting with 256mb of ram, half of whats installed.
Fearing a dead Ram modual I did a little swapping this evening and have discovered something even worse, its a pair of DIMM Slots that are dead, both ram chips work perfectly, and Im currently getting all 512mb, but its only on one channel, not my usual dual channel.
Of note, CPU-Z detected both Ram moduals, but said the 2nd Channel was disabled?
When booted it only showed 256mb being used, yet the 2nd modual is clearly being recognised?
Both were in the correct slots to work with Dual channel, and it would not boot at all with just one modual in either of the slots on the second channel (which, according to the manual (yes I read it) it shouuld).
The M/B is a Gigabyte GA7-N400 PRO2, with 4 DIMM Slots in 2 Channels.
I suppose I want to know if anyone has had any experiance with a whole DIMM channel simply failing? (i was careful when I moved the M/B, but you never know).
If so, was it fixable (im not expecting so), and did the rest of the board follow shortly after?
Im more concerned about what effect the failure might have on the life of the M/B and possibly the whole system.
If its not going to cause a cascade of failures then Ill simply not use that channel (which sucks) and add 2x512mb chips (get rid of the current pair), then up grade the graphics card.
This is the cheapest option, and leaves me the most money to spend on Glass, sorry to help with the "mortage" when I propose to the better half.
If it is likely to cause a cascade, well then I need to replace it.
Which could be expensive, it will mean new M/B, new chip (the old one is AMD Socket A, and no one makes Socket A boards anymore), as well as a new Graphics card and Ram.
I can save on the Ram (its DDR333) for a few months, but I see little point in getting another AGP8X M/B as its being phased out, so I can't even save on the Graphics card.
A used M/B would be hard to find, it needs to have SATA as well as lots of USB ports etc etc, and of course you never know how good its going to be.
And of course its been so long that Im a bit out of touch as to whats good, and whats not?
If I have to get a new M/B CPU it needs to be someing at high end of the performance scale.
It needs to be AMD (I don't like Intell (shamelss irrational brand loyalty))
It needs to be a Gigabyte or ASUS M/B.
And it needs to be reasonably priced, this year I have to propose, get some glass for the resulting camera, and buy a house. All on the average wage for someone in thier late 20s, which strangly enough I am.
Thank you to anyone that can help, and sorry for the Rant, Im a bit of detail junky sometimes. 
)DIMM slot was one of the worst design errors in the history of the PC. The amount of force required to properly seat a DIMM is so variable,. and so often way to much,. that it's a wonder people are busting Mobo's all the time (in fact I think they might be)
