dual channel not supported by motherboard??

[fishface313]

i recently bought new ram to add to my system, i picked up some OCZ dual channel pc2700 (512mb x 2), my old memory pc2700(256mb x 2) that i had in my system was single channel...i installed the dual channel in slots 1 and 3 and the old ram in slots 2 and 4...everything worked fine for 2 days, and yesterday i was getting random system restarts every 2-3 minutes. i took out the new ram and kept in my old ram and everything is working fine. where can i find out if my mobo supports dual channel? and if it does or does not support it, why was my system fine for 2 days then all of a sudden not working? thanks, any help is appreciated

 

[Budman]

Are we supposed to play a guessing game here?

Mobo maker?
Model??

 

[fishface313]

you can guess....

asus p4sd-vl

have fun searching for it, i havn't found it anywhere. i can't find any info on it. i came with a sony vaio i bought about a year ago, i recently bought a new case, psu, video card, so the only thing left over from the vaio is the mobo and cpu. i have looked on sony's site, asus' site. i can't find any info about the mobo anywhere.

 

[fjorner]

Have you tried the new memory alone?

Not sure... do most motherboards support single and dual sticks in at the same time?

 

[Budman]

looks like your computer is actualy a SONY PCV-RZ65C , that's why it's not listed on asus's website.

It has a 865G chipset so yes it supports Dual channel.

 

[redhatlinux]

I'm not sure if any mobos support a mix of dual channel and single. My guess would be that through a BIOS setting, dual channel would have to be turned off for all slots. Its possible that the memory controller has the smarts to auto select but I don't think so.

 

[fishface313]

acually its a sony pcv-rs510.... i dunno how much of a difference their is between those two models...

and no i didn't try this new memory by itself yet...i was planning on doing that later today but i wanted to find out whats going on....

 

[egkenny]

If a motherboard has two memory controllers then it supports dual-channel operation. If a stick of memory is in slots supported by each memory controller then dual-channel operation is possible. For example if controller 1 supports memory in slots 1 and 3 and controller 2 supports memory in slots 2 and 4 then memory in slots 1 and 2 can run dual-channel. It all depends upon the motherboard how to configure the memory. Of course since memory timing is critical then putting different memory sticks in a dual-channel system could cause problems. Some motherboards are more forgiving than others.

BTW, there is no such thing as dual-channel memory. These are just sticks of memory tested together to see if they work well together in dual-channel motherboards. If they do they they are sold as matched sets otherwise they are probably sold singly.

The computer I build 3 years ago has a dual-channel motherboard. There were no so called dual-channel memory sold back then. I just used two sticks of the same high quality memory and have had no problems.

They only started selling matched pairs when some people were having problems with using two sticks of the same RAM together with a dual-channel motherboard. Some motherboards were so picky that they required memory to have close timing specs to work well together. Testing pairs together was the only easy way to do this.

 

[Bozo Galora]

http://www.clearanceclub.com/depot/quelle_showroom.cgi?ad_ref=froogle&sku=1778

 

[fishface313]

bozo...i already know all of whats on that link...

i tried installing just the new ram and again, windows loads about halfway and system restarts.... i don't understand how everything was working fine for 2 days then on the 3rd day my system shits the bed and this new ram stops working????!?!?!?!

 

[Bozo Galora]

well, Mr. fishface (race slander???).......

the link I provided showed you have an Intel 865GV chipset, which shuold tell you all you want to know, since you said you searched and couldnt find ANYTHING. This is an P4P800 variant DUAL CHANNEL 166FSB version of the 865.
You could have used CPU-Z to findout and/or SiSoft Sandra 2005.
And while we are at it - did you ever think about trying a few runs of memtest86+????

Also note this:

http://www.4allmemory.com/index.cfm?fus...arch&manufacturer_id=77&model_id=42970

(Quote)
Memory Details About Your System
PC2700 DDR SDRAM DIMMs. Supports Dual Channel DDR.
Your Sony VAIO PCV-RS510 only supports modules made with a specific type of chip. Should you find what seems to be the exact same memory elsewhere for a lower price, it is very possible that the cheaper memory will not work in your computer. By using the 4allmemory.com "Memory Finder" your selected memory modules are
Guaranteed To Work or your money back!
(Unquote)

BTW: I have added your name to my "do not attempt to help" list

 

[fjorner]

Guys, don't be so mean. He's obviously just a little frustrated by this.

Since your new RAM did work at one point, and doesn't now, I'd consider the possibility that the new RAM is defective. Try one of the sticks alone, then the other. If one fails and the other doesn't, I'd say that one of those sticks is defective, you need to get a exchange. If NEITHER stick works alone, then you have yourself two sticks on INCOMPATIBLE RAM. Get a refund for both of them.

Nuff said.

 

[fishface313]

oh no i lost a friend...how sad...anyway

since my mobo does support dual channel(or so that link says, i still can't find where it says what chipset i have on that link), why is this ram still not working???? like i said, i tried it by itself and my system just keeps restarting in the middle of windows booting. old ram is still going strong and im not having any problems with it....and like i asked about 3 other times, and still havn't gotten an answer, or something along the lines of an answer, for:"why did everything work fine for 2 days, and off of a sudden nothing seems to be working???????///"

 

[fishface313]

...............so here is the update.................

i contacted sony, the guy i was talking to said to install the new ram and enter bios and reset to my default bios. well i did this and it now magically works again. my system IS detecting 1.5GB of ram. so as of right now the new ram is back in and working again. ill give it untll tonight, if its still working then good! if for some reason it starts acting up again, then obviously im going to go with fjorner and assume one or both of the sticks are faulty. and one more thing, am i right in saying that since my system is now detecting 1.5GB of ram, that the new ram is in fact the correct kind??? so if i am right and my system does start to act up again, i can safely say that the ram is shot???

 

[Budman]

http://www.memtest.org/

 

[stevty2889]

You really need to run memtest, to be sure. Sometimes motherboards just have incompattibilty problems with certain ram, and it doesn't even neccessarily mean the ram is bad. If there are any problems with the ram, or the compatibility, memtest will get errors, and you'll know for sure, rather than sitting and waiting for it to mess up again.