RAM Weirdness

**houseisland** · September 27th, 2009, 11:42 AM

I have an HP dc7100.

I have four 1Gb strips of Buffalo Select DDR 400.

Each strip tests OK in the system. Any three strips together will test OK in the system. And yes... this is days of testing.

Put the fourth strip in and MemTest crashes about 8 minutes and 30 seconds into the test, and the system is frozen.

Ok, so quite rightly you are thinking it might be the fourth socket that is the problem, but no..... I can put other RAM in secondary pair of slots and it is OK. I put other RAM in the primary slots and the Buffalo RAM in the secondary slots and it is OK.

Ok, so you are thinking that maybe the system doesn't like 4 Gb of RAM. But no... it works just fine with 4 Gb of RAM from other manufacturers. It works fine with 4 Gb of RAM as long as not more than three of the strips are the Buffalo RAM.

I have used the Buffalo RAM to upgrade a number of older systems because it is cheap and because generally there are few problems with it. I have had no problems with it in SIS, Via, and nVidia chipset systems.

Recently I have had problems with it in HP Intel chipset boxes. The dc7100 herein discussed, and with my FrankenPC Windows Home Server, where the RAM seemed not to like the slightly higher voltages from the new PS in the box.

Weird.

____________________________________________

It is my pure and virtuous heart that
gives me the strength of ten!

**CCT** · September 27th, 2009, 05:50 PM

A thread at NCIX about that Ram says that dual channel configuration requires 2.6 volts and many mobos are stock set at 2.5.

http://forums.ncix.com/forums/index....&overclockid=0

**slgrieb** · September 27th, 2009, 07:58 PM

CCT has a good link there, especially since I expect your HP has an Asus board. It isn't that unusual for 4 populated slots to require a bit of a voltage boost in BIOS. Also bet your HP won't let you.

I had a similar experience with Corsair memory on a system I built recently, so I wouldn't even say the problem is brand specific. I'd be tempted to point the finger at the mobo more than the memory.

**houseisland** · September 27th, 2009, 09:10 PM

Originally Posted by CCT

A thread at NCIX about that Ram says that dual channel configuration requires 2.6 volts and many mobos are stock set at 2.5.

http://forums.ncix.com/forums/index....&overclockid=0

Thanks. It has to be something like that.

____________________________________________

It is my pure and virtuous heart that
gives me the strength of ten!

**houseisland** · September 27th, 2009, 09:18 PM

Originally Posted by slgrieb

I expect your HP has an Asus board.

I don't think so. It is a corporate model. The retail lines often have the Asus boards. There is nothing Asus looking about the board here at all.

Originally Posted by slgrieb

It isn't that unusual for 4 populated slots to require a bit of a voltage boost in BIOS. Also bet your HP won't let you.

At bet you would win.

Originally Posted by slgrieb

I had a similar experience with Corsair memory on a system I built recently, so I wouldn't even say the problem is brand specific. I'd be tempted to point the finger at the mobo more than the memory.

Well... I can point all I want but it won't do any good. If I were willing to $hell out for $tock HP part$, it would be just fine.

I have some no-name OEM DDR 400 RAM, which spent many happy years in a Shuttle system and which has been recently languishing in my spares box. The HP box won't even post with this stuff - just unhappy BIOS beeps.

Picky, picky, picky....

____________________________________________

It is my pure and virtuous heart that
gives me the strength of ten!

**CCT** · September 28th, 2009, 09:55 AM

Maybe one of people with older locked laptops wants to experiment with this for overclocking - I stumbled across it; http://www.pbus-167.com/

**slgrieb** · September 28th, 2009, 12:32 PM

Ah, the joy of genuine HP! I just bought a roller kit for a 2200dtn for &79, when the (out of stock) aftermarket kit is $39. With expedited shipping it was $97+. Of course, I'm sure there's really high grade plastic and rubber in the HP kit, even it does look and wear exactly like the cheap kit.

**houseisland** · September 28th, 2009, 10:20 PM

Originally Posted by slgrieb

Ah, the joy of genuine HP! I just bought a roller kit for a 2200dtn for &79, when the (out of stock) aftermarket kit is $39. With expedited shipping it was $97+. Of course, I'm sure there's really high grade plastic and rubber in the HP kit, even it does look and wear exactly like the cheap kit.

If you buy an HP corporate grade PC with a 3 year warranty and you buy it sufficiently spec'd that it will provide an acceptable level of service for the warranty period, you would be hard pressed to find something more stable and easy to support. For a large,standardized corporate environment, HP corporate PCs would always be my first choice. I have absolutely nothing bad to say about them at all.

The problems arise when you want to limp them along after the warranty expires. Parts become very expensive. The days of completely proprietary hardware are largely gone but still it can be a challenge to find, for example, a fan that will actually fit as a replacement on one of the heatsinks that Foxcon or Coolermaster has custom made for HP and replacing the heat sink completely is not always an easy option because of cap location on the motherboard - if you are good a metal work, mods to the heat sinks and mounting clips can be done but by the time you are finished you could have bought a couple of new PCs if your time has any value. And yes, there things like problems with RAM.

If I had gone to Kingston's RAM configurator, I could have gotten something that would have conformed to HP's tech tolerances, but the cost would have considerably higher than with the Buffalo RAM.

I saved my money and I took my chances.

____________________________________________

It is my pure and virtuous heart that
gives me the strength of ten!