Memory slot puzzle

HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the two 1Gb
DDR2-5300 memory sticks it would boot.
There are 4 slots, 2 blue ones next to each other and 2 black ones next to
the blue ones. Both chips were in the blue slots, none in the black ones.
http://mewnlite.com/HPslots.jpg (if that helps).
I had a new matched pair of those DDR2-5300's so I took the remaining one
out and installed the new ones. No joy. After a lot of mixing and moving I
finally wound up with the two original sticks but I now have one of them in
a blue slot and the other in a black one and everything is working. And it
sees 2 gigs as it should.
I've looked the a6200n up on the HP site and several memory company sites
and the most detail I can get is that there are 4 slots and they can handle
up to 8 Gb (4 X 2). But I don't find anything about pairing them up.
I'll run memtest on it tonight but the computer is running error free now.
Plus the fact that the two new ones didn't work side by side tends to make
me believe there is nothing wrong with the memory.
The owner claims he's never had the cover off.
I'll probably just let him take it as is and see what happens, but
something is weird.
Any ideas?

--
--- Long live Fat32! ---

On 1/11/2011 8:11 PM, Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the two 1Gb
DDR2-5300 memory sticks it would boot.
There are 4 slots, 2 blue ones next to each other and 2 black ones next to
the blue ones. Both chips were in the blue slots, none in the black ones.
http://mewnlite.com/HPslots.jpg (if that helps).
I had a new matched pair of those DDR2-5300's so I took the remaining one
out and installed the new ones. No joy. After a lot of mixing and moving I
finally wound up with the two original sticks but I now have one of them in
a blue slot and the other in a black one and everything is working. And it
sees 2 gigs as it should.
I've looked the a6200n up on the HP site and several memory company sites
and the most detail I can get is that there are 4 slots and they can handle
up to 8 Gb (4 X 2). But I don't find anything about pairing them up.
I'll run memtest on it tonight but the computer is running error free now.
Plus the fact that the two new ones didn't work side by side tends to make
me believe there is nothing wrong with the memory.
The owner claims he's never had the cover off.
I'll probably just let him take it as is and see what happens, but
something is weird.
Any ideas?

If you put the sticks back into the configuration that originally gave
you a problem, does the problem reappear?

I cannot say what is happening, exactly, but I've fixed this problems
before just with a firm reseat of the module, or maybe a blast of
electrical cleaner or canned air. Obviously it was some sort of contact
problem, but it's hard to pinpoint.

In one scenario, I was able to identify a dead slot because one of the
pins had either fatigued and broken off, or was possibly defective from
the start. In that case, the user didn't really noticed that they were
only getting half of their memory other than generally poor performance.

Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the two 1Gb
DDR2-5300 memory sticks it would boot.
There are 4 slots, 2 blue ones next to each other and 2 black ones next to
the blue ones. Both chips were in the blue slots, none in the black ones.
http://mewnlite.com/HPslots.jpg (if that helps).
I had a new matched pair of those DDR2-5300's so I took the remaining one
out and installed the new ones. No joy. After a lot of mixing and moving I
finally wound up with the two original sticks but I now have one of them in
a blue slot and the other in a black one and everything is working. And it
sees 2 gigs as it should.
I've looked the a6200n up on the HP site and several memory company sites
and the most detail I can get is that there are 4 slots and they can handle
up to 8 Gb (4 X 2). But I don't find anything about pairing them up.
I'll run memtest on it tonight but the computer is running error free now.
Plus the fact that the two new ones didn't work side by side tends to make
me believe there is nothing wrong with the memory.
The owner claims he's never had the cover off.
I'll probably just let him take it as is and see what happens, but
something is weird.
Any ideas?


The a6200n uses an AM2 based motherboard. So that tosses some
theories out the window. Memory population should be flexible.
As Grinder suggests, it could be a bad slot. AM2 has the
memory controller on the processor itself, so a damaged
processor is also a possibility, in terms of tracing
where the fault lies. Or a broken pin in the memory slot.

"Motherboard Specifications, MCP61PM-HM (Nettle2)"
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...=3 548643#N94

( http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...null&site=null )

Retest the original DIMMs. Start with slot #1. Test with the
first DIMM, then test with the second DIMM. Record whether
the thing works or not. Next, move to slot #2. Test the DIMMs
one at a time again. Perhaps with a little testing, you can
figure out which DIMM always fails or which slot fails, and
so on.

Say that one of the DIMMs work, and only in slot #2. Now,
install the new DIMMs into slot #3 and slot #4 (ignoring
broken slot #1 say). Do all three slots work ? Is the total
detected memory correct ?

Are the new memories 2x1GB DDR2-5300 that you bought ?
I would think, even if the modules were single sided and
used 128Mx8 chips (for a total of 1GB per DIMM), it should
still work. As far as I know, the AM2 is pretty tolerant of
density issues, unlike other chipset controllers.

Paul

On Tue, 11 Jan 2011 20:11:37 -0600, Menno Hershberger wrote:


Any ideas?

Dual-channel mode is fscked. One blue one black will not try to use dual-
channel.

Paul wrote in
:

Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the
two 1Gb DDR2-5300 memory sticks it would boot.
There are 4 slots, 2 blue ones next to each other and 2 black ones
next to the blue ones. Both chips were in the blue slots, none in the
black ones. http://mewnlite.com/HPslots.jpg (if that helps).
I had a new matched pair of those DDR2-5300's so I took the remaining
one out and installed the new ones. No joy. After a lot of mixing and
moving I finally wound up with the two original sticks but I now have
one of them in a blue slot and the other in a black one and
everything is working. And it sees 2 gigs as it should.
I've looked the a6200n up on the HP site and several memory company
sites and the most detail I can get is that there are 4 slots and
they can handle up to 8 Gb (4 X 2). But I don't find anything about
pairing them up. I'll run memtest on it tonight but the computer is
running error free now. Plus the fact that the two new ones didn't
work side by side tends to make me believe there is nothing wrong
with the memory. The owner claims he's never had the cover off.
I'll probably just let him take it as is and see what happens, but
something is weird.
Any ideas?


The a6200n uses an AM2 based motherboard. So that tosses some
theories out the window. Memory population should be flexible.
As Grinder suggests, it could be a bad slot. AM2 has the
memory controller on the processor itself, so a damaged
processor is also a possibility, in terms of tracing
where the fault lies. Or a broken pin in the memory slot.

"Motherboard Specifications, MCP61PM-HM (Nettle2)"
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...7676&tmp_task=
prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&site=null&key= null&product=3548643#
N94

( http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...tmp_rule=33891
&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&prod uct=3548643&key=null&
site=null )

Retest the original DIMMs. Start with slot #1. Test with the
first DIMM, then test with the second DIMM. Record whether
the thing works or not. Next, move to slot #2. Test the DIMMs
one at a time again. Perhaps with a little testing, you can
figure out which DIMM always fails or which slot fails, and
so on.

Did that using slots #3 and #4. The picture of the motherboard you posted
a link to shows the blue ones as being 3 and 4. Neither chip fails in
either slot as long as they're run seperately.

Say that one of the DIMMs work, and only in slot #2. Now,
install the new DIMMs into slot #3 and slot #4 (ignoring
broken slot #1 say). Do all three slots work ? Is the total
detected memory correct ?

The blue slots are #3 & #4. Either one of the original modules will work
in either slot alone. Each of them registers as 1 GB in BIOS & Windows.
The OS is Vista (my apologies for cross posting to the XP group)
32 bit Vista runs intolerably slow with only 1 GB of memory .
If I put both of them back in 3 & 4, the computer won't boot.
If I put one of them in slot 2 (black) and one in slot 4 (blue) then it
boots fine and registers 2GB. Windows also runs reasonably well with 2GB
even if it *is* Vista. :-)

Are the new memories 2x1GB DDR2-5300 that you bought ?
I would think, even if the modules were single sided and
used 128Mx8 chips (for a total of 1GB per DIMM), it should
still work. As far as I know, the AM2 is pretty tolerant of
density issues, unlike other chipset controllers.

Except for brand name, the specs on the modules are the same:
New ones are Samsung 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12-E3
Old ones are Hynix 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12 (without the E3)

I'm currently running memtest with the modules in slots 2 & 4. It just
completed 1 pass with no errors. I ran his up to date Trend Micro
antivirus on it earlier. It took almost 2 hours to complete but it found
nothing. Actually I ran it twice. The power settings were set for sleep
at 2 hours and that it did. Nothing I tried would bring it out of it so I
held the button in till it died, rebooted, changed that setting to
"never" and ran the AV again since I never really saw the results the
first time..

The only thing I *haven't* tried is running them both in slots 1 and 2.
I'll sleep a couple more hours while memtest is running and then try
that.

Thanks. I'll keep you posted.

--
--- Long live Fat32! ---

Grinder wrote in
:

On 1/11/2011 8:11 PM, Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the
two 1Gb DDR2-5300 memory sticks it would boot.
There are 4 slots, 2 blue ones next to each other and 2 black ones
next to the blue ones. Both chips were in the blue slots, none in the
black ones. http://mewnlite.com/HPslots.jpg (if that helps).
I had a new matched pair of those DDR2-5300's so I took the remaining
one out and installed the new ones. No joy. After a lot of mixing and
moving I finally wound up with the two original sticks but I now have
one of them in a blue slot and the other in a black one and
everything is working. And it sees 2 gigs as it should.
I've looked the a6200n up on the HP site and several memory company
sites and the most detail I can get is that there are 4 slots and
they can handle up to 8 Gb (4 X 2). But I don't find anything about
pairing them up. I'll run memtest on it tonight but the computer is
running error free now. Plus the fact that the two new ones didn't
work side by side tends to make me believe there is nothing wrong
with the memory. The owner claims he's never had the cover off.
I'll probably just let him take it as is and see what happens, but
something is weird.
Any ideas?

If you put the sticks back into the configuration that originally gave
you a problem, does the problem reappear?

Yes

I cannot say what is happening, exactly, but I've fixed this problems
before just with a firm reseat of the module, or maybe a blast of
electrical cleaner or canned air. Obviously it was some sort of
contact problem, but it's hard to pinpoint.

While I haven't actually blown the slots out, I have inspected the slots
up close with a flashlight. The slots are clean and all the pins seem to
be intact. And as I mentioned in my reply to Paul, both slots work when
used alone. Except for a little bit of dust in the heat sink, the inside
of the case was dust free.

In one scenario, I was able to identify a dead slot because one of the
pins had either fatigued and broken off, or was possibly defective
from the start. In that case, the user didn't really noticed that
they were only getting half of their memory other than generally poor
performance.

--
--- Long live Fat32! ---

Derek Turner wrote in news:8p5dunFau4U1
@mid.individual.net:

On Tue, 11 Jan 2011 20:11:37 -0600, Menno Hershberger wrote:


Any ideas?

Dual-channel mode is fscked. One blue one black will not try to use dual-
channel.

I thought about that but I see no indication in any of the specs that this
configuration uses dual channel.

Shame on you. You need to wash your fingers out with some fscking soap :-)


--
--- Long live Fat32! ---

Menno Hershberger wrote:
Paul wrote in
:

Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the
two 1Gb DDR2-5300 memory sticks it would boot.
There are 4 slots, 2 blue ones next to each other and 2 black ones
next to the blue ones. Both chips were in the blue slots, none in the
black ones. http://mewnlite.com/HPslots.jpg (if that helps).
I had a new matched pair of those DDR2-5300's so I took the remaining
one out and installed the new ones. No joy. After a lot of mixing and
moving I finally wound up with the two original sticks but I now have
one of them in a blue slot and the other in a black one and
everything is working. And it sees 2 gigs as it should.
I've looked the a6200n up on the HP site and several memory company
sites and the most detail I can get is that there are 4 slots and
they can handle up to 8 Gb (4 X 2). But I don't find anything about
pairing them up. I'll run memtest on it tonight but the computer is
running error free now. Plus the fact that the two new ones didn't
work side by side tends to make me believe there is nothing wrong
with the memory. The owner claims he's never had the cover off.
I'll probably just let him take it as is and see what happens, but
something is weird.
Any ideas?

The a6200n uses an AM2 based motherboard. So that tosses some
theories out the window. Memory population should be flexible.
As Grinder suggests, it could be a bad slot. AM2 has the
memory controller on the processor itself, so a damaged
processor is also a possibility, in terms of tracing
where the fault lies. Or a broken pin in the memory slot.

"Motherboard Specifications, MCP61PM-HM (Nettle2)"
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...7676&tmp_task=
prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&site=null&key= null&product=3548643#
N94

( http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...tmp_rule=33891
&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&prod uct=3548643&key=null&
site=null )

Retest the original DIMMs. Start with slot #1. Test with the
first DIMM, then test with the second DIMM. Record whether
the thing works or not. Next, move to slot #2. Test the DIMMs
one at a time again. Perhaps with a little testing, you can
figure out which DIMM always fails or which slot fails, and
so on.

Did that using slots #3 and #4. The picture of the motherboard you posted
a link to shows the blue ones as being 3 and 4. Neither chip fails in
either slot as long as they're run seperately.

Say that one of the DIMMs work, and only in slot #2. Now,
install the new DIMMs into slot #3 and slot #4 (ignoring
broken slot #1 say). Do all three slots work ? Is the total
detected memory correct ?

The blue slots are #3 & #4. Either one of the original modules will work
in either slot alone. Each of them registers as 1 GB in BIOS & Windows.
The OS is Vista (my apologies for cross posting to the XP group)
32 bit Vista runs intolerably slow with only 1 GB of memory .
If I put both of them back in 3 & 4, the computer won't boot.
If I put one of them in slot 2 (black) and one in slot 4 (blue) then it
boots fine and registers 2GB. Windows also runs reasonably well with 2GB
even if it *is* Vista. :-)

Are the new memories 2x1GB DDR2-5300 that you bought ?
I would think, even if the modules were single sided and
used 128Mx8 chips (for a total of 1GB per DIMM), it should
still work. As far as I know, the AM2 is pretty tolerant of
density issues, unlike other chipset controllers.

Except for brand name, the specs on the modules are the same:
New ones are Samsung 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12-E3
Old ones are Hynix 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12 (without the E3)

I'm currently running memtest with the modules in slots 2 & 4. It just
completed 1 pass with no errors. I ran his up to date Trend Micro
antivirus on it earlier. It took almost 2 hours to complete but it found
nothing. Actually I ran it twice. The power settings were set for sleep
at 2 hours and that it did. Nothing I tried would bring it out of it so I
held the button in till it died, rebooted, changed that setting to
"never" and ran the AV again since I never really saw the results the
first time..

The only thing I *haven't* tried is running them both in slots 1 and 2.
I'll sleep a couple more hours while memtest is running and then try
that.

Thanks. I'll keep you posted.


OK, if either blue slot can run with either DIMM alone (four test cases),
that makes it sound like the RAM is OK. And other than verifying the
select signals on the black slots, they probably work too.

About the only other thing I can think of, is the single phase Vdimm
switching power converter has become weak. On one of my motherboards, I
did extensive power measurements as a function of DIMM config,
and dual channel might have sucked down an extra ampere of current or so.

The toroid to the right of the DIMM slots, might be part of the power
converter. There are also two electrolytic caps, and you'd check the
tops of those for bulging or swelling. If it's a leaking cap problem,
that might be why it's become weak.

That's about the only thing that comes to mind. I would have expected
Vista to work with 2GB installed.

You said you're going to snooze, while your current test is running. When
you wake up, I suggest swapping the two DIMMs for one another, and testing
again using the same two slots. I know this is a single channel configuration.
Memtest86+ can't test the bottom one megabyte of memory, and by swapping
the DIMMs, and running a quick test again, you would complete your test
coverage. That's the purpose of swapping, and running a quick test again.
(If you're in a hurry, just run Test #5, using the menu to advance
the test number.)

But that doesn't really shed any light on the problem.

Neither is it helping explain, why the new DIMMs don't work.

Paul

Paul wrote in
:

Menno Hershberger wrote:
Paul wrote in
:

Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the
two 1Gb DDR2-5300 memory sticks it would boot.
There are 4 slots, 2 blue ones next to each other and 2 black ones
next to the blue ones. Both chips were in the blue slots, none in
the black ones. http://mewnlite.com/HPslots.jpg (if that helps).
I had a new matched pair of those DDR2-5300's so I took the
remaining one out and installed the new ones. No joy. After a lot
of mixing and moving I finally wound up with the two original
sticks but I now have one of them in a blue slot and the other in a
black one and everything is working. And it sees 2 gigs as it
should. I've looked the a6200n up on the HP site and several memory
company sites and the most detail I can get is that there are 4
slots and they can handle up to 8 Gb (4 X 2). But I don't find
anything about pairing them up. I'll run memtest on it tonight but
the computer is running error free now. Plus the fact that the two
new ones didn't work side by side tends to make me believe there is
nothing wrong with the memory. The owner claims he's never had the
cover off. I'll probably just let him take it as is and see what
happens, but something is weird.
Any ideas?

The a6200n uses an AM2 based motherboard. So that tosses some
theories out the window. Memory population should be flexible.
As Grinder suggests, it could be a bad slot. AM2 has the
memory controller on the processor itself, so a damaged
processor is also a possibility, in terms of tracing
where the fault lies. Or a broken pin in the memory slot.

"Motherboard Specifications, MCP61PM-HM (Nettle2)"
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...077676&tmp_tas
k=
prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&site=null&key= null&product=354864
3# N94

( http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...y?tmp_rule=338
91
&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&prod uct=3548643&key=nul
l& site=null )

Retest the original DIMMs. Start with slot #1. Test with the
first DIMM, then test with the second DIMM. Record whether
the thing works or not. Next, move to slot #2. Test the DIMMs
one at a time again. Perhaps with a little testing, you can
figure out which DIMM always fails or which slot fails, and
so on.

Did that using slots #3 and #4. The picture of the motherboard you
posted a link to shows the blue ones as being 3 and 4. Neither chip
fails in either slot as long as they're run seperately.

Say that one of the DIMMs work, and only in slot #2. Now,
install the new DIMMs into slot #3 and slot #4 (ignoring
broken slot #1 say). Do all three slots work ? Is the total
detected memory correct ?

The blue slots are #3 & #4. Either one of the original modules will
work in either slot alone. Each of them registers as 1 GB in BIOS &
Windows. The OS is Vista (my apologies for cross posting to the XP
group) 32 bit Vista runs intolerably slow with only 1 GB of memory .
If I put both of them back in 3 & 4, the computer won't boot.
If I put one of them in slot 2 (black) and one in slot 4 (blue) then
it boots fine and registers 2GB. Windows also runs reasonably well
with 2GB even if it *is* Vista. :-)

Are the new memories 2x1GB DDR2-5300 that you bought ?
I would think, even if the modules were single sided and
used 128Mx8 chips (for a total of 1GB per DIMM), it should
still work. As far as I know, the AM2 is pretty tolerant of
density issues, unlike other chipset controllers.

Except for brand name, the specs on the modules are the same:
New ones are Samsung 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12-E3
Old ones are Hynix 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12 (without the E3)

I'm currently running memtest with the modules in slots 2 & 4. It
just completed 1 pass with no errors. I ran his up to date Trend
Micro antivirus on it earlier. It took almost 2 hours to complete but
it found nothing. Actually I ran it twice. The power settings were
set for sleep at 2 hours and that it did. Nothing I tried would bring
it out of it so I held the button in till it died, rebooted, changed
that setting to "never" and ran the AV again since I never really saw
the results the first time..

The only thing I *haven't* tried is running them both in slots 1 and
2. I'll sleep a couple more hours while memtest is running and then
try that.

Thanks. I'll keep you posted.


OK, if either blue slot can run with either DIMM alone (four test
cases), that makes it sound like the RAM is OK. And other than
verifying the select signals on the black slots, they probably work
too.

About the only other thing I can think of, is the single phase Vdimm
switching power converter has become weak. On one of my motherboards,
I did extensive power measurements as a function of DIMM config,
and dual channel might have sucked down an extra ampere of current or
so.

The toroid to the right of the DIMM slots, might be part of the power
converter. There are also two electrolytic caps, and you'd check the
tops of those for bulging or swelling. If it's a leaking cap problem,
that might be why it's become weak.

That's about the only thing that comes to mind. I would have expected
Vista to work with 2GB installed.

You said you're going to snooze, while your current test is running.
When you wake up, I suggest swapping the two DIMMs for one another,
and testing again using the same two slots. I know this is a single
channel configuration. Memtest86+ can't test the bottom one megabyte
of memory, and by swapping the DIMMs, and running a quick test again,
you would complete your test coverage. That's the purpose of swapping,
and running a quick test again. (If you're in a hurry, just run Test
#5, using the menu to advance the test number.)

But that doesn't really shed any light on the problem.

Neither is it helping explain, why the new DIMMs don't work.

Here's what memtest is showing after 17 passes
http://mewnlite.com/mtest.jpg

I will reverse them and let it make at least a pass but then I need to
zip it up because the guy is coming after it.

Thanks for all your input. Notice on that screen that it is only showing
1919Mb. Is this what you're referring to about the bottom one megabyte
not being tested?

--
--- Long live Fat32! ---

Menno Hershberger wrote in
news:Xns9E6B9DDD9BDB9butter@wefb973cbe498:

Paul wrote in
:

Menno Hershberger wrote:
Paul wrote in
:

Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of
the two 1Gb DDR2-5300 memory sticks it would boot.
There are 4 slots, 2 blue ones next to each other and 2 black ones
next to the blue ones. Both chips were in the blue slots, none in
the black ones. http://mewnlite.com/HPslots.jpg (if that helps).
I had a new matched pair of those DDR2-5300's so I took the
remaining one out and installed the new ones. No joy. After a lot
of mixing and moving I finally wound up with the two original
sticks but I now have one of them in a blue slot and the other in
a black one and everything is working. And it sees 2 gigs as it
should. I've looked the a6200n up on the HP site and several
memory company sites and the most detail I can get is that there
are 4 slots and they can handle up to 8 Gb (4 X 2). But I don't
find anything about pairing them up. I'll run memtest on it
tonight but the computer is running error free now. Plus the fact
that the two new ones didn't work side by side tends to make me
believe there is nothing wrong with the memory. The owner claims
he's never had the cover off. I'll probably just let him take it
as is and see what happens, but something is weird.
Any ideas?

The a6200n uses an AM2 based motherboard. So that tosses some
theories out the window. Memory population should be flexible.
As Grinder suggests, it could be a bad slot. AM2 has the
memory controller on the processor itself, so a damaged
processor is also a possibility, in terms of tracing
where the fault lies. Or a broken pin in the memory slot.

"Motherboard Specifications, MCP61PM-HM (Nettle2)"
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...1077676&tmp_ta
s k=
prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&site=null&key= null&product=35486
4 3# N94

( http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...ry?tmp_rule=33
8 91
&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&prod uct=3548643&key=nu
l l& site=null )

Retest the original DIMMs. Start with slot #1. Test with the
first DIMM, then test with the second DIMM. Record whether
the thing works or not. Next, move to slot #2. Test the DIMMs
one at a time again. Perhaps with a little testing, you can
figure out which DIMM always fails or which slot fails, and
so on.

Did that using slots #3 and #4. The picture of the motherboard you
posted a link to shows the blue ones as being 3 and 4. Neither chip
fails in either slot as long as they're run seperately.

Say that one of the DIMMs work, and only in slot #2. Now,
install the new DIMMs into slot #3 and slot #4 (ignoring
broken slot #1 say). Do all three slots work ? Is the total
detected memory correct ?

The blue slots are #3 & #4. Either one of the original modules will
work in either slot alone. Each of them registers as 1 GB in BIOS &
Windows. The OS is Vista (my apologies for cross posting to the XP
group) 32 bit Vista runs intolerably slow with only 1 GB of memory .
If I put both of them back in 3 & 4, the computer won't boot.
If I put one of them in slot 2 (black) and one in slot 4 (blue) then
it boots fine and registers 2GB. Windows also runs reasonably well
with 2GB even if it *is* Vista. :-)

Are the new memories 2x1GB DDR2-5300 that you bought ?
I would think, even if the modules were single sided and
used 128Mx8 chips (for a total of 1GB per DIMM), it should
still work. As far as I know, the AM2 is pretty tolerant of
density issues, unlike other chipset controllers.

Except for brand name, the specs on the modules are the same:
New ones are Samsung 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12-E3
Old ones are Hynix 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12 (without the E3)

I'm currently running memtest with the modules in slots 2 & 4. It
just completed 1 pass with no errors. I ran his up to date Trend
Micro antivirus on it earlier. It took almost 2 hours to complete
but it found nothing. Actually I ran it twice. The power settings
were set for sleep at 2 hours and that it did. Nothing I tried would
bring it out of it so I held the button in till it died, rebooted,
changed that setting to "never" and ran the AV again since I never
really saw the results the first time..

The only thing I *haven't* tried is running them both in slots 1 and
2. I'll sleep a couple more hours while memtest is running and then
try that.

Thanks. I'll keep you posted.


OK, if either blue slot can run with either DIMM alone (four test
cases), that makes it sound like the RAM is OK. And other than
verifying the select signals on the black slots, they probably work
too.

About the only other thing I can think of, is the single phase Vdimm
switching power converter has become weak. On one of my motherboards,
I did extensive power measurements as a function of DIMM config,
and dual channel might have sucked down an extra ampere of current or
so.

The toroid to the right of the DIMM slots, might be part of the power
converter. There are also two electrolytic caps, and you'd check the
tops of those for bulging or swelling. If it's a leaking cap problem,
that might be why it's become weak.

That's about the only thing that comes to mind. I would have expected
Vista to work with 2GB installed.

You said you're going to snooze, while your current test is running.
When you wake up, I suggest swapping the two DIMMs for one another,
and testing again using the same two slots. I know this is a single
channel configuration. Memtest86+ can't test the bottom one megabyte
of memory, and by swapping the DIMMs, and running a quick test again,
you would complete your test coverage. That's the purpose of
swapping, and running a quick test again. (If you're in a hurry, just
run Test #5, using the menu to advance the test number.)

But that doesn't really shed any light on the problem.

Neither is it helping explain, why the new DIMMs don't work.

Here's what memtest is showing after 17 passes
http://mewnlite.com/mtest.jpg

I will reverse them and let it make at least a pass but then I need to
zip it up because the guy is coming after it.

Thanks for all your input. Notice on that screen that it is only
showing 1919Mb. Is this what you're referring to about the bottom one
megabyte not being tested?

OK, I made two passes with them reversed - no errors.
And lastly, I tried both sticks in the two black slots. It wouldn't boot
up. I also tried putting in the new memory in addition to to the
original, filling all 4 slots. That didn't work either.

Although it is currently working, I'll advise the owner to expect more
trouble. If it was mine, I'd be looking for a new one in the near
future.

--
--- Long live Fat32! ---

On 1/11/2011 9:11 PM, Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the two 1Gb
snip....
Any ideas?


On the off chance that the memory sticks are 'matched' only under some
circumstances, have you reset the machine's CMOS and gone back to totally
default settings? If the memory voltage or timing got diddled accidentally
the sticks might be responding differently than they should and from each
other. This would be of no major concern if they are running individually
or in different channels, but when running dual-channel timing can become
iffy and prevent booting and if it does boot it can be very unstable.

I had this problem with my Q6600 HTPC which proved to be _very_ sensitive
to what sort of memory it would run in dual-channel. Mine would boot and
run but crashed for no discernible reason until I tried the third set of
matched sticks. Top-range Crucial memory sets failed but a cheap no-name
set from Newegg has been running perfectly for year now.

John McGaw wrote in
:

On 1/11/2011 9:11 PM, Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the
two 1Gb
snip....
Any ideas?


On the off chance that the memory sticks are 'matched' only under some
circumstances, have you reset the machine's CMOS and gone back to
totally default settings? If the memory voltage or timing got diddled
accidentally the sticks might be responding differently than they
should and from each other. This would be of no major concern if they
are running individually or in different channels, but when running
dual-channel timing can become iffy and prevent booting and if it does
boot it can be very unstable.

I had this problem with my Q6600 HTPC which proved to be _very_
sensitive to what sort of memory it would run in dual-channel. Mine
would boot and run but crashed for no discernible reason until I tried
the third set of matched sticks. Top-range Crucial memory sets failed
but a cheap no-name set from Newegg has been running perfectly for
year now.

Well, the guy hasn't come to pick it up yet so I may just try that.
Especially since I did notice (but never mentioned) that the time and date
on the thing was January 2007. I reset it to the proper time. It's really
not old enough for the battery to be dead. Maybe something *did* happen to
the CMOS. I've got a battery on hand. I think I'll replace it and reset it
as you suggest and see what happens. Thanks for the suggestion!

--
--- Everybody has a right to my opinion. ---

Menno Hershberger wrote:
Menno Hershberger wrote in
news:Xns9E6B9DDD9BDB9butter@wefb973cbe498:

Paul wrote in
:

Menno Hershberger wrote:
Paul wrote in
:

Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of
the two 1Gb DDR2-5300 memory sticks it would boot.
There are 4 slots, 2 blue ones next to each other and 2 black ones
next to the blue ones. Both chips were in the blue slots, none in
the black ones. http://mewnlite.com/HPslots.jpg (if that helps).
I had a new matched pair of those DDR2-5300's so I took the
remaining one out and installed the new ones. No joy. After a lot
of mixing and moving I finally wound up with the two original
sticks but I now have one of them in a blue slot and the other in
a black one and everything is working. And it sees 2 gigs as it
should. I've looked the a6200n up on the HP site and several
memory company sites and the most detail I can get is that there
are 4 slots and they can handle up to 8 Gb (4 X 2). But I don't
find anything about pairing them up. I'll run memtest on it
tonight but the computer is running error free now. Plus the fact
that the two new ones didn't work side by side tends to make me
believe there is nothing wrong with the memory. The owner claims
he's never had the cover off. I'll probably just let him take it
as is and see what happens, but something is weird.
Any ideas?

The a6200n uses an AM2 based motherboard. So that tosses some
theories out the window. Memory population should be flexible.
As Grinder suggests, it could be a bad slot. AM2 has the
memory controller on the processor itself, so a damaged
processor is also a possibility, in terms of tracing
where the fault lies. Or a broken pin in the memory slot.

"Motherboard Specifications, MCP61PM-HM (Nettle2)"
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...1077676&tmp_ta
s k=
prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&site=null&key= null&product=35486
4 3# N94

( http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...ry?tmp_rule=33
8 91
&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&prod uct=3548643&key=nu
l l& site=null )

Retest the original DIMMs. Start with slot #1. Test with the
first DIMM, then test with the second DIMM. Record whether
the thing works or not. Next, move to slot #2. Test the DIMMs
one at a time again. Perhaps with a little testing, you can
figure out which DIMM always fails or which slot fails, and
so on.
Did that using slots #3 and #4. The picture of the motherboard you
posted a link to shows the blue ones as being 3 and 4. Neither chip
fails in either slot as long as they're run seperately.

Say that one of the DIMMs work, and only in slot #2. Now,
install the new DIMMs into slot #3 and slot #4 (ignoring
broken slot #1 say). Do all three slots work ? Is the total
detected memory correct ?
The blue slots are #3 & #4. Either one of the original modules will
work in either slot alone. Each of them registers as 1 GB in BIOS &
Windows. The OS is Vista (my apologies for cross posting to the XP
group) 32 bit Vista runs intolerably slow with only 1 GB of memory .
If I put both of them back in 3 & 4, the computer won't boot.
If I put one of them in slot 2 (black) and one in slot 4 (blue) then
it boots fine and registers 2GB. Windows also runs reasonably well
with 2GB even if it *is* Vista. :-)

Are the new memories 2x1GB DDR2-5300 that you bought ?
I would think, even if the modules were single sided and
used 128Mx8 chips (for a total of 1GB per DIMM), it should
still work. As far as I know, the AM2 is pretty tolerant of
density issues, unlike other chipset controllers.
Except for brand name, the specs on the modules are the same:
New ones are Samsung 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12-E3
Old ones are Hynix 1GB 2Rx8 PC2-5300U-555-12 (without the E3)

I'm currently running memtest with the modules in slots 2 & 4. It
just completed 1 pass with no errors. I ran his up to date Trend
Micro antivirus on it earlier. It took almost 2 hours to complete
but it found nothing. Actually I ran it twice. The power settings
were set for sleep at 2 hours and that it did. Nothing I tried would
bring it out of it so I held the button in till it died, rebooted,
changed that setting to "never" and ran the AV again since I never
really saw the results the first time..

The only thing I *haven't* tried is running them both in slots 1 and
2. I'll sleep a couple more hours while memtest is running and then
try that.

Thanks. I'll keep you posted.

OK, if either blue slot can run with either DIMM alone (four test
cases), that makes it sound like the RAM is OK. And other than
verifying the select signals on the black slots, they probably work
too.

About the only other thing I can think of, is the single phase Vdimm
switching power converter has become weak. On one of my motherboards,
I did extensive power measurements as a function of DIMM config,
and dual channel might have sucked down an extra ampere of current or
so.

The toroid to the right of the DIMM slots, might be part of the power
converter. There are also two electrolytic caps, and you'd check the
tops of those for bulging or swelling. If it's a leaking cap problem,
that might be why it's become weak.

That's about the only thing that comes to mind. I would have expected
Vista to work with 2GB installed.

You said you're going to snooze, while your current test is running.
When you wake up, I suggest swapping the two DIMMs for one another,
and testing again using the same two slots. I know this is a single
channel configuration. Memtest86+ can't test the bottom one megabyte
of memory, and by swapping the DIMMs, and running a quick test again,
you would complete your test coverage. That's the purpose of
swapping, and running a quick test again. (If you're in a hurry, just
run Test #5, using the menu to advance the test number.)

But that doesn't really shed any light on the problem.

Neither is it helping explain, why the new DIMMs don't work.
Here's what memtest is showing after 17 passes
http://mewnlite.com/mtest.jpg

I will reverse them and let it make at least a pass but then I need to
zip it up because the guy is coming after it.

Thanks for all your input. Notice on that screen that it is only
showing 1919Mb. Is this what you're referring to about the bottom one
megabyte not being tested?

OK, I made two passes with them reversed - no errors.
And lastly, I tried both sticks in the two black slots. It wouldn't boot
up. I also tried putting in the new memory in addition to to the
original, filling all 4 slots. That didn't work either.

Although it is currently working, I'll advise the owner to expect more
trouble. If it was mine, I'd be looking for a new one in the near
future.


The 1919 would be 2048 minus 1MB for BIOS low memory area minus 128MB
reserved for built-in graphics GPU. Some BIOS will allow the GPU
allocation to be changed, with options like 64MB or 128MB. Others,
will automatically allocate more memory for GPU, if larger sticks
are plugged in.
Athlon 64 X2 5000+ ---------- slot 1 ----- slot 3
| ---------- slot 2 ----- slot 4
|
| HT bus
|
PCI Express x16 slot --- 6150SE ------------- PCI bus slots
Built-in GPU
Single chip
Chipset
|
SATA, IDE etc

The memory slots connect directly to the processor. The GPU inside the
6150SE could cause a problem, if it is causing the system to crash
in the BIOS. But I don't see how it would influence the memory
test cases, as they're hosted by the CPU. The 6150SE can't tell
what you're doing to the DIMM slots.

You have one working single channel config (like using 1,3 or 2,4).
You could test the other single channel config.

The fact a single stick works, when used on either bus, says both
bus segments are working. When that happens, all that is left in
terms of verification, is whether individual slot selection
signals are working. A broken or dirty pin in a slot could also
affect only that slot. Your testing hasn't isolated a bad slot.

The Vdimm switching regulator, to the right of the DIMM slots, powers
the DIMMs. Extra power is drawn, when in dual channel mode. Running
sticks in 1,2 would draw 1 amp more, than running them in 1,3. The
system experiences higher performance in 1,3 for example, as the
memory bandwidth is doubled. Turning on a memory channel, increases
power consumption. I would inspect the two electrolytic caps on
the switcher to the right of the DIMM slots, for bulging or leaking.
A weak switcher, could cause a memory failure at startup (in a
dual channel mode).

The fact that the memory passes memtest, when run single channel,
and with the DIMMs swapped for one another, proves all the memory
works, so it's not "bad memory in the GPU area" or "bad memory
in the BIOS area". This is why I had you run the swapping test case,
so the DIMM would either function in the low memory area
or the high memory area and get completely tested.

Low memory High memory
----- First DIMM -------- Second DIMM DIMMs in single channel config


Low memory High memory
----- Second DIMM ------- First DIMM DIMMs in single channel config

I'm still not seeing a pattern here, to the pass/fail cases. So
far, the real mystery seems to be:

1) Won't run dual channel (Vdimm switcher issue?)
2) Did not like the new sticks, even one at a time.

Paul

John McGaw wrote in
:

On 1/11/2011 9:11 PM, Menno Hershberger wrote:
HP Pavilion a6200n won't boot up.
By process of elimination I discovered that if I removed one of the
two 1Gb
snip....
Any ideas?


On the off chance that the memory sticks are 'matched' only under some
circumstances, have you reset the machine's CMOS and gone back to
totally default settings? If the memory voltage or timing got diddled
accidentally the sticks might be responding differently than they
should and from each other. This would be of no major concern if they
are running individually or in different channels, but when running
dual-channel timing can become iffy and prevent booting and if it does
boot it can be very unstable.

I had this problem with my Q6600 HTPC which proved to be _very_
sensitive to what sort of memory it would run in dual-channel. Mine
would boot and run but crashed for no discernible reason until I tried
the third set of matched sticks. Top-range Crucial memory sets failed
but a cheap no-name set from Newegg has been running perfectly for
year now.

I almost made it through this whole thread without screwing up my identity.
My default is "Lil' Abner" and I forgot to change it on that reply. Anyway,
I did replace the battery and cleared the CMOS (with the jumper). That put
the time back to Jan 1, 2007 again. I booted it up, shut it down, and then
moved the memory sticks together in the blue slots, but it still won't boot
up that way.
Your idea definitely gave me some hope though... :-)
Thanks again.

--
--- Long live Fat32! ---

On Wed, 12 Jan 2011 22:57:18 -0500, Li'l Abner wrote:

not old enough for the battery to be dead. Maybe something *did* happen to
the CMOS. I've got a battery on hand. I think I'll replace it and reset it
as you suggest and see what happens. Thanks for the suggestion!

Note that some motherboards require you to clear the cmos anytime you change
the memory configuration. For example, see
http://www.fixya.com/support/t430354...cs_mobo_l7vmm3
Apparently it only updates the dsdt, if it's clear.

While replacing the battery, clear the cmos and then try all four sticks.

Regards, Dave Hodgins

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