Bad RAM, or bad HD?

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About this blog: Computers hate me. They really do. Every time I try to do something unusual like add new hardware, something is guaranteed to go wrong. I decided to start writing about my constant problems so that someone else might benefit from my experiences - or at least laugh at them!

01 July 2008, 05:14am

I recently installed an additional HD and an additional 4GB RAM (total 8GB) into one of my servers. Since then it's locked up 4 times. It's probably the RAM: sometimes the comp won't reset properly (screen clears, HD light blips, but POST never starts - have to power off then on again). Could be the HD though.

Each pair of RAM sticks are the same model, but they were purchased a few months apart. FreeBSD 7.0 has no problems with 8GB of the same model of memory in another server, but that's using another motherboard and chipset. It could be faulty RAM, or it may be some sort of incompatibility quirk.

Currently running a memory test using Memtest86+, unfortunately the basic tests haven't found any problems so far. Hopefully with time and more rigorous testing there will be a smoking gun reported, so I can exchange the sticks...

UPDATE: with the suspect sticks in the "primary" set of slots Memtest86 GPF'd (FreeBSD's panic also reported a GPF), in the secondary slots there were unfortunately zero errors reported. I've swapped the suspect sticks into another server that has been set to do a lot of data shuffling that will use almost all available memory. If it crashes then the sticks are going back. If the first server still crashes even with the suspect sticks swapped out then I have a bigger problem.

UPDATE #2: the second server crashed. Sticks are going back tomorrow.