A few years ago, I helped a couple friends build home computers. Both were Athlon64 X2 machines and they performed well. Last year, I put together a system using an XFX Micro-ATX 680i 7150. Initially, I had a 2.8GHz Pentium D LGA-775 and 4GB of DDR2-800 and an 8800GT. The problem with the setup was that it was only capable of single channel memory. Over several months, I worked on an upgrade process of several new parts. First was a Q9400 2.66GHz Core 2 Quad. Next, I picked up a Gigabyte EP45T-UD3LR and two 2GB Crucial Ballistix red Tracers, DDR3-12800 (1600MHz). In hindsight, I probably should not have gone with this combination. Yesterday, I got my Antec TruePower New 750w PSU and the Cooler Master V8, and started putting it all together.
Using the manual as a guide, I placed the two memory modules in slots 1 and 3 and turned on the system. I entered the BIOS and began looking around, but within a few seconds, the lights on my Razer keyboard and mouse went out and the BIOS clock stopped ticking. The lights on the memory modules were still cycling, so I thought WTH? I shut the machine off, waited a few seconds and turned it back on. Back into the BIOS and it did mostly the same thing. I had time enough to set the first boot device, disable the parallel port and enable USB support before it locked up, so nothing got saved. This went on a couple more times before I tried loading failsafe defaults, then optimal defaults. Sometimes, I would get a little more time out of it, but never more than a few minutes. I dug out a PS/2 keyboard and started using it instead. When the computer freezes, the lights on the keyboard begin blinking on and off.
After numerous attempts, and much cursing, I managed to get the system pseudo-stable running with a single stick of memory (either stick of memory). Using optimal defaults, where the memory is discovered as 1333MHz with 9-9-9-24 timings at 1.500V, I can boot from CD, install and configure Ubuntu. Individually, the memory modules will run Memtest86+ for 6 - 7 hours and never throw any errors, but together, whether they're set up for single channel or dual channel, they will either throw errors or lock up within a minute.
I posted this to Crucial's forum:
Can anyone help me sort this out? My intention is to populate the system with 8GB of memory, hopefully at the 1600MHz the memory is rated for, but so far, I have my doubts and the Gigabyte motherboard has me extremely put off.
Using the manual as a guide, I placed the two memory modules in slots 1 and 3 and turned on the system. I entered the BIOS and began looking around, but within a few seconds, the lights on my Razer keyboard and mouse went out and the BIOS clock stopped ticking. The lights on the memory modules were still cycling, so I thought WTH? I shut the machine off, waited a few seconds and turned it back on. Back into the BIOS and it did mostly the same thing. I had time enough to set the first boot device, disable the parallel port and enable USB support before it locked up, so nothing got saved. This went on a couple more times before I tried loading failsafe defaults, then optimal defaults. Sometimes, I would get a little more time out of it, but never more than a few minutes. I dug out a PS/2 keyboard and started using it instead. When the computer freezes, the lights on the keyboard begin blinking on and off.
After numerous attempts, and much cursing, I managed to get the system pseudo-stable running with a single stick of memory (either stick of memory). Using optimal defaults, where the memory is discovered as 1333MHz with 9-9-9-24 timings at 1.500V, I can boot from CD, install and configure Ubuntu. Individually, the memory modules will run Memtest86+ for 6 - 7 hours and never throw any errors, but together, whether they're set up for single channel or dual channel, they will either throw errors or lock up within a minute.
I posted this to Crucial's forum:
Can anyone help me sort this out? My intention is to populate the system with 8GB of memory, hopefully at the 1600MHz the memory is rated for, but so far, I have my doubts and the Gigabyte motherboard has me extremely put off.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram