Strange RAM problem

30 Mar 2005 4:06 PM

Zotin Khuma

This is about a strange problem I'm facing after I did some
upgrades and swapping between some of the computers in
my house.

I upgraded my children's computer with an Athlon 64 CPU
+ mobo + RAM, keeping the same gfx card, HDD, etc.
I took their Athlon XP 2600+, Biostar M7NCG-400 and
256MB DDR400 stick and used them to upgrade my office
computer.

The office computer was a Sempron 2400+ on another
M7NCG-400 mobo and should not have needed any
software changes. And it did run fine - for about 5 minutes.
Then it restarted, again and again, sometimes even before
it finished booting up. Sometimes it just crashes or hangs.
Sometimes the mouse freezes but the keyboard still works.

After doing a lot of this and that to isolate the problem,
I narrowed it down to the RAM. Sure enough, replacing
the RAM cures it completely.

The odd thing is that that particular stick of RAM works
flawlessly on three other computers (alone, without other
sticks). I also tested it for four hours with memtest86 v3.1
on the computer where it caused all those crashes, and it
passed with flying colours.

I repeated the swaps and substitutions between four
computers several times, with consistent results. That
RAM stick works in all other computers except my office
computer. My office comp works with all other RAM
sticks except the one with which it had been working
flawlessly for several months as my children's gaming
machine.

I also checked the BIOS as far as I know how, loaded
default settings, underclocked, swapped the PSU........
I'm stumped. Any suggestions please ?

30 Mar 2005 7:13 PM

Fitz

Possibly the RAM is not getting the voltage it needs in the one
computer to run stable. You might try increasing the voltage by
..1 (in the BIOS) and see if that has any effect.

Fitz