Ram unstable at STOCK (No overclock anywhere)

[coreydmorton]

I have PC2-5300 (333mhz) DDR2 ram. And it's UNSTABLE, and it's driving me unbelievably crazy. No matter what timings i set it to, or what voltage i give it, it remains unstable. It's the only stick in there. I tried another DDR2 stick, (400mhz) and it works fine, but it's only one gig and i can't even run games with 1gb of ram. I'm at a loss, really. What could it BE??? I've run AMD overdrive, and it only gives errors with that ram in there, so i don't even need to run memtest to know it's unstable, AMD overdrive works well enough for me.

So this is my system:
Motherboard: gigabyte ga-ma78LM-S2H
Ram: PC2-5300 (333mhz)
Video card: GTX 570
CPU: Phenom II 925 (2.8ghz)
There are no overclocks on my pc, i turned them all off too isolate the ram issue, and that's exactly what it turned out to be, because even with no OC my ram is unstable. This is weird and i'd do anything for some good advice haha This issue has been plaguing me forever. My pc doesn't freeze or anything, it's not THAT unstable, but games keep crashing with that ram in there, and AMD overdrive crashes with that ram too.
Thanks everyone!

 

[omnipanzer]

Is your bios up to date?
If so RMA the RAM. Most memory is warranted for life.

 

[coreydmorton]

Is your bios up to date?
If so RMA the RAM. Most memory is warranted for life.

I don't have any paperwork for the ram. And all my bios's are up to date, including drivers. (for the gpu,motherboard, everything)

 

[omnipanzer]

Get an identical stick and then RMA it. then you have double the ram and it's the only way I can think of that you won't take a bath on it. It really sounds like you've already done a through job of TS the issue. I'd still run a memtest just because I'm curious and it would verify that i'm not chasing my tail.

 

[coreydmorton]

Meh, it's just when i post a huge question, i don't want the first response to be RMA IT. lol I don't have the money to buy more ram, i'm a broke student, and i can't RMA it because i bought this pc from another person. Though unless you can say with 100% positivity it's BROKEN, then i can't accept an RMA JUST yet haha

edit: i ran memtest, it's getting errors, aurghhh there's no reason it should be unstable XD

 

[omnipanzer]

I understand but there really isn't any way around bad memory. :^(

 

[Cyberat_88]

Is the MB bank voltage matching the voltage on the 333mhz sticks, how about the 400mhz sticks ? I have a crappy ECS that will not stabilize under 2.7v even though it's technically capable of it, found out sticks voltage required is 2.6v and MB default is 2.5v. Again works fine with one stick, seldom if any crashes, but never with both in, identical in mfg., model and performance.

 

[coreydmorton]

Is the MB bank voltage matching the voltage on the 333mhz sticks, how about the 400mhz sticks ? I have a crappy ECS that will not stabilize under 2.7v even though it's technically capable of it, found out sticks voltage required is 2.6v and MB default is 2.5v. Again works fine with one stick, seldom if any crashes, but never with both in, identical in mfg., model and performance.

What's MB bank voltage? CPUID recommends 1.8, and the pc bumps it to 1.9. I've tried 1.8,1.9,2.0, which all yield the same results.

 

[Cyberat_88]

Then 1.8v is your motherboard memory bank default voltage. You need Ram that is 1.8v without OC, discard "compatibility" info, it's either 1.8v or move on. Of course keep in mind the other memory specs. motherboard requires like no-ECC, no-Parity, non-Registered, etc...
All I am saying is "bad memory" is not always that, you see it as bad memory because it throws errors when voltage mismatched, requirements mismatched, that's all. There is such thing as defective ram, just eliminate the obvious first.