RAM and ECC errors

[rp911]

I've been trying to give my 06 2.66 MP a speed boost by adding some RAM and installing an SSD hard drive for system and apps. (That hard drive is a miracle. What a difference.)

But I'm having hassles with ECC errors. I started out with just 3 GB of RAM, the original 512 chips, which are fine, and some 1GB OWC sticks I had put in in 2007. I noticed that one of the 1GB was generating ECC errors ... usually between 20 and 40 after the machine had been on a while, and always the one in the first slot.

Since I was ordering more anyway, I called OWC on their lifetime warranty to get those replaced, which they sent me new ones for, and ordered two 2GB sticks to boost me up to 7 GB total.

The 2 GB sticks were dead in the water, didn't register at all, even after cleaning the contacts with alcohol and a pencil eraser. They are sending me a new pair, should be here today.

So I install the two old 1 GB sticks in the back slots, and put the two new 1GB sticks in the front slots. Both the new ones are generating ECC errors, too, and the first one has a whopping 200,000 + after being on for an hour. Second just has a handful.

So, I'm batting .000 on OWC RAM ... how common is this? Is it worth replacing RAM if it's just generating a few errors here and there? It's getting a little ridiculous, now I have to send back those two 1G chips I just bought and why am I thinking that the next batch either won't work or generate errors as well? How typical is this experience?

Any thoughts appreciated.

 

[philipma1957]

your slots may be bad not the ram

 

[cutterman]

Couple of times when I removed the trays to upgrade RAM in my 2007 (2,1) the RAM wasn't detected. Had to reseat the tray smartly to get it to work. Was fine after that.

 

[rp911]

Thanks. I did try a few times to reseat the trays with the 2GB chips. Also, the smaller sticks in slots 3 and 4 of that particular tray were detected.

I'm not thinking it's the slots affecting the RAM because the older "bad" 1 GB sticks still generated errors when they were moved to another slot.

Is OWC known for unreliable RAM? Is Crucial any better?

 

[Umbongo]

Is OWC known for unreliable RAM? Is Crucial any better?

No they aren't known for unreliable RAM. OWC don't manufacture it, Crucial are the only retailer that make their own (they are Micron's retail arm). Sometimes you can get multiple lots of memory from the same vendor and they all have problems but it is just defective memory. Try someone else and if problems persist I'd say that the error is somewhere else. You might want to find someone who can test the memory that was found to be bad or get confirmation from the retailer, some won't bother to check it is bad.