Posts by jesseb07

a 3rd option has opened up as well. As seen in my other threads, Im scavenging on my mom's old computer, her ram is compatible with mine, so I'll try maybe 1G of slightly older ram and maybe just return the new stuff and save $60. But I'll have to see when I get back to my dorm. Thanks for the replys.

I looked at the processor, it runs at 533 Mhz, and it looks brand new, the specifications on the top of the processor is a little faded, but it isn't discolored. So as long as I guess it looks ok, it should be ok?

any suggestions at all?

When I had mixed ram, before my bios upgrade it did the exact same thing. I had to upgrade the bios so that it wouldn't fail on boot with a PEN_LIST_CORRUPT. I run a Gateway 500 SE with Windows xp and the original bios only supported 512MB, but the motherboard supports up to 1G, so I updated the bios, which fixed the problem (mostly), and then I could boot and operate the system normally.

I left my desktop at school since I only came home for labor day, so I can't switch them until monday, and then my 30 days for my ram return will be up, so if possible, I'd like to keep using my new stuff, but it's worth a try. Is there any further suggestions? I'm also gonna reinstall/upgrade firefox since it seems like that always starts it. That may just be that that's the program that is open the longest, so there's a higher probability that the problem would happen when it's open. ok, thanks for the reply!

I am currently running 2 brand new sticks of 512 MB Kingston PC 3200 DDR ram, I can't imagine how they wouldn't be compatible, they're exactly the same thing. I still have my old ram, but it is not in use, I only have 2 slots. So, if you meant if I had any of my older ram left, I don't, sorry for the confusion. Thanks for the reply.

hi, I had 512mb ram (super old, I think it was PC400) in my computer, Best Buy had a sale on Kingston 512 3200, so I bought some. My motherboard (also 5 years old) can support 1G ram but only up to PC2100. I've read everywhere that memory is backwards compatible as long as it's the same type (DDR, DDR2, etc). I buy it and put it in (had to upgrade the bios for it to work) and it works fine. Except randomly, usually while I'm in firefox, firefox will crash then keep crashing immediately on reopening the program. Then I get a blue screen about a PEN_LIST_CORRUPT. I've read that means bad ram, but I ran memtest 86 with 1 stick at a time (once in each slot) so a total of 4 times and no errors. Then I try it with both sticks in, and sometimes I get errors, and other times I stop it at 300% with no errors. what's going on? The individual ram sticks don't seem to be bad and the slots are fine. Windows reads it at .99 Gb (when I upgraded the bios it seemed to take a larger chunk of it away, but the bios upgrade was required for 1G ram). So, any suggestions? it's been under 30 days since I got it, so Best Buy will probably take it back if it's bad, but it seems strange. I'm gonna run memtest again while I'm in classes today and see what happens this time. Thanks!

My mom's mobo got fried cause she installed her ram wrong, this caused an arc and fried it. I was curious, her comp had a P4 2.66 in it and mine has a very modest 1.8 (it's 5 years old). Doing some research on my motherboard I found that it's capable of up to 2.8. If frying the motherboard somehow damaged the cpu and I put it in my machine, would it potentially do any damage? I was kinda happy about almost a 1Ghz upgrade for free but I wouldn't do it if it would fry my computer. I could always just put my 1.8 back in if the other didn't work, but I don't wanna wreck my computer. Any advice?

Oh, here are my comp specs, not sure if you need them:
Gateway 500SE
1 G Kingston ram
1.8 GHz P4
Motherboard uses intel 845GL chipset (couldn't nail down the exact mobo cause gateway does some alterations)

well, my mom took the computer to best buy, and they ran some tests and found out that putting the ram in backwards probably caused an electrical arc, effectively killing the mobo. Thanks for your help anyway!

I probably should add that the motherboard doesn't give any beep codes, and that, as far as I can tell, is not a good sign

thanks for the quick response. I reseated the old ram, still nothin, tried it in the other slot, nothin. I also tried just the new memory in both slots, nothin.

Hi, my mom has a Dell Dimension 4550 that has been running fairly smooth for several years. Recently she tried to install some new DDR ram in to the mobo, and VERY incorrectly seated it. She asked me to look at it (after the fact) cause her computer would power up, but not load bios. Turns out she had the ram in upside down, so naturally because of the notch it didn't go in right at all. I seated the ram properly and tried to turn it on, same thing. I even removed the new piece of ram, leaving the original 512, and it still won't boot. Any tests I can run to see if the mobo is fried? any suggestions I would appreciate. Thanks!