I ordered more memory and a new processor to give my old laptop a boost. I think one of the chips is bad - is there a way to check it before I call the vendor and ask for a replacement?
how to tell if RAM is bad
- Thread starter jacksonpt
- Start date
Back when I was a tech, we used to have software that could run diagnostics on ram chips by testing reads and writes outside of the OS. It's been so long I forget what it was even called.
One thing to check though... Have you tried switching the positions of the chips? Maybe pulling them all, cleaning really good and then reseating them? That used to work like magic.
Know how many bad RAM chips I encountered in my tech career? None. Bad sockets were quite common.
Bad RAM chips aren't all that rare. It is a good idea to do some swapping to make sure it's the chip and not the socket, though.
MemTest86 is what you need, Jackson. You can download the Ultimate Boot CD and it's built right in:
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/
Make sure you let it run at least 2-3 passes.
MemTest86 is what you need, Jackson. You can download the Ultimate Boot CD and it's built right in:
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/
Make sure you let it run at least 2-3 passes.
Yea, I swapped in a few different chips, moved them around, tried the suspect chip in both slots, etc etc etc. It's definitely something about the chip...