Failing Ram

Hi Guys, I realize that this isn't the best forum to ask this question, but I know many of you are tech savy enough to possibly help me. Feel free to delete if truly doesn't belong here.

To start, my computer specs are as follows:

Windows Vista Ultimate

Intel Quad Core Q6600

MSI P6N Platinum

1GB x 4 Crucial Ballistix DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)

Nvidia Geforce 8800 GTS

2 IDE HDD

1 SATA HDD

Everything is stock

Now, as far as my problem, 2 days ago, I was surfing the web when I experienced a BSOD. This was the third time I had since I installed Vista back in Nov 08, so I brushed it off as some random occurrence and rebooted. Unfortunately, they kept on coming back within moments of windows starting. I then booted into safe mode, installed anti-virus and did a scan, came back clean.

I then ran Memtest86+ which came back to a shit-ton of errors. So I then took each stick of ram and put each one in each slot (for a total of 16 combos), and each one came back clean. I also tried using only sticks 2 and 4, which came back to errors as well.

I am confused here, as having ran each stick alone in each slot coming back with no errors, how should I move forward here? I am unsure if it is one stick of ram that's bad, or perhaps a bad slot, or is it the combination of the sticks? I am ready to buy new ram, however I do not want to do that and come back to the same issue.

For the record, I am also aware that the RAM I am using on newegg is reviewed quite terribly. I bought this machine off a guy from school, and I added 2 sticks to the type that was already in there. Should I buy more I will go with a different brand/model.

Any help is extremely appreciated.

#527973

There are three possibilities here:

- The RAM sticks are bad and can't be used two or more in same motherboard.

- The motherboard is bad.

- The power source is bad (really improbable, but easy to check: enter BIOS, Hardware Monitor (or similar) and check the voltage levels).

Check your motherboard accepts PC2 6400 sticks.

Try buying Kingston memory instead, I always do (both at home and at work) and can say it's are really, really hard to get a bad one from that manufacturer (though yeah they are twice as expensive here heheh).

#527978

Thanks for the reply. I think that it is probably a bad ram stick. The RAM as far as I know is able to run in it's current configuration, as it did for close to 8 months. But while I was testing I was unable to single out which one, even when testing each stick in each slot. Figuring out the exact problem is really my issue at this point, and I feel like I've done just about everything a trained technician would do.

#527980