Bizarre memory behavior

[wherzwaldo]

For the past 7 months I've been running off a 512MB stick of Mushkin DDR400 memory (my motherboard is MSI, and Mushkin is a "recommended" memory brand). Recently, I decided to purchase some cheap AData memory (also 512MB DDR400) off Newegg and expand my system to 1GB. However, when I put the memory in, the computer wouldn't boot - repeated beeps, monitor wouldn't wake up, no audible HDD activity. Taking the AData stick out would allow the computer to boot again.

I sent it back to Newegg for a replacement, but it didn't work either. I was about to send the second stick back for a refund but decided to go out and buy some Kingston memory first. Well, when I added the Kingston stick to my system, it still didn't work. On a whim, I left the Kingston in, took out the Mushkin and it booted. So, on another whim, I put in the AData RAM with the Kingston and the system booted again.

Was something wrong with the Mushkin RAM? The computer was working fine before with just the one stick. I'm a little pissed that I never tried the AData by itself before, as I am now out $10 return shipping and won't be getting a refund on anything. If the Mushkin is still good I would like to try and sell it. If the memory is bad, I would like to try and replace it under warranty.

 

[Bottom Line]

I'm not a tech expert, but something similar happened to me about a year ago when I was adding memory....computer would not boot with the different memory sticks. I took it to the local computer shop and they quickly identified the problem(memory sticks had different specs). They gave me new memory sticks and it worked fine. Expect to get burned when you buy the 'cheap' stuff.

BL

 

[wherzwaldo]

The weird thing is that the cheap stuff is what I ended up using (along with the Kingston).

Oh well.

 

[TexasOwnzYou]

try contacting muskin support The Link

they'll prolly end up sending you replacement memory (you'll have to pick up shipping one way) so you can see whether the problem is w/ the stick or your mobo.