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bad ram or not !?


knibe

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I've had some problems with my newly build PC!

It has rare but random crashes and often blue-screens with a BAD POOL CALLER on shutdown.

 

I suspected the RAM and after upgrading to the latest BIOS, I've run a series of tests using the memtest.org utility. It fails. After reading the forum, I've increased the RAM voltage 2.1, but it still fails. I've run the test several times, and it fails at the same location: Test4, pass 0, Failure address: 000268cabd0 - 616.4MB Good: 7eeb4c42 bad: 76eb4c42

 

I've also tried to disable set by SPD and override memory latency to the 5-5-5-15-2T setting suggested for the P5B MB on the the corsair website, but that just made it fail even more.

 

Some facts:

 

RAM: TWIN2X2048-6400 - RAM Corsair XMS2 2 x 1 GB 2 x 1 GB (2 GB) / DUAL R

MB: Asus AiLifestyle / Intel P965 Express med Intel CORE 2 DUO 2.66GHz.

ASUSTeK Computer INC. P5B533-E Rev 1.xx

Bus Clock: 266 megahertz

BIOS: American Megatrends Inc. 0701 10/02/2006

RAM Voltage Level set in BIOS: 2.1V.

 

Slot 'DIMM0' has 1024 MB

Slot 'DIMM1' is Empty

Slot 'DIMM2' has 1024 MB

Slot 'DIMM3' is Empty

 

Please help ?!

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ok...I've now tried to run with one 1024MB corsair dimm at a time... both of them fails the memtest. So am I stuck with two broken corsair memory dimms? :eek: or is the memory is simply incompatible with my motherboard ? :confused:

 

Thanks for any reply.

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thanks Wired, but I figured it was not likely that both dimms were bad, so I did some extra bios tweaking... I've now force-changed the RAM frequency from "auto" to 800MHz. The memtest has run for 40 minutes without errors...So my guess is that it has been running at the wrong frequency ?!
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  • 1 year later...

Sorry, I know it has been a while :bigeyes:, but I thought I'd write since I never managed to get the system stable afterall.

 

Turns out that while the system did become _more_ stable by the bios tweaks, the memtest would still fail if left alone long enough.

 

For everyday work that meant that the system would "work" most of the time, but occasionally blue screen/freeze or reboot without warning. I learned to live with that...sad story but true. :[pouts:

 

Now, recently, due to another hardware problem, I was forced to deal with it! I started to bios tweak the settings systematically to see if I could get the memtest to pass in any way, starting with vanilla default bios settings and going towards all the p5b tweaks I could dig up on this forum.

 

I first upgraded the bios to the newest 2008 version from ASUS.

I then ran cpu-z to get the STD settings:

 

Corsair CM2X1024-6400 DDR2, PC2-6400 (400MHz):

CAS# Latency: 5.0

RAS# to CAS#: 5

RAS# Precharge: 5

tRAS: 18

tRC: 22

Voltage: 1.8V

 

I then reset the bios to standard settings and booted up Memtest86+ v2.01:

It failed almost instantly (after 6 minutes):

0:06:21: Tst 4, Failing Address: 000268c7b90, Err-Bits: 08000000

 

I then manually set the freq to 800 MHz and dimm voltage to 2.0V - failed:

0:53:33: Tst 2, Failing Address: 000268c7b90, Err-Bits: 08000000

 

I then manually set the freq to 800 MHz and dimm voltage to 2.1V - failed:

9:02:05: Tst 4, Failing Address: 000268c7b90, Err-Bits: 08000000

 

I then manually set the freq to 800 MHz and dimm voltage to 2.1V, write to precharge delay to 15, and disabled legacy USB support - failed:

4:16:56: Tst 6, Failing Address: 000268c7b90, Err-Bits: 08000000

 

For some reason the default bios settiings where 5 6 6 18 instead of 5 5 5 18

so I did one last test where I manually set the freq to 800 MHz and dimm voltage to 2.1V, timing to 5 5 5 18, write to precharge delay to 15, and disabled legacy USB support - failed instantly:

0:01:16: Tst 3, Failing Address: 000268c7b90, Err-Bits: 08000000

 

Then I gave up...and today I went out and bought the cheapest 2x1024 PC2-6400 DDR2 sticks I could find from another vendor (RAM is cheaper nowadays). I've just reset the bios to standard settings and replaced the corsair with the new ones. Memtest is running right now. No error for more than an hour. I'll write tomorrow and let you know how it manages 10 more hours or so.

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Okay... Not sure if this is worth while though...since sending it to the states will cost me :confused: ...but thanks!

 

The new modules ran memtest+ (with default bios settings, 800MHz, 5 5 5 18) for more than 14 hours solid before I stopped the machine - no errors found :sunglasse, so I guess RMA is the right thing.

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  • Corsair Employees
Okay... Not sure if this is worth while though...since sending it to the states will cost me :confused: ...but thanks!

 

The new modules ran memtest+ (with default bios settings, 800MHz, 5 5 5 18) for more than 14 hours solid before I stopped the machine - no errors found :sunglasse, so I guess RMA is the right thing.

 

You may want to contact your reseller to see if they can help you replace the modules, or if all else fails, contact our customer service at 888-222-4346 and dial "0", (510) 657-8747 or email rmaservice@corsairmemory.com and see if they can give you any options that would help accommodate the RMA.

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