Mixed Ram Brands, same timings...

[Treripica]

Kingston has RAM for Lenovo T60's that are matched down to the submodel number. We've had a number of these purchased for our T60's at work (all the same model/submodel). 2 of the machines experience OS hangs intermittently (screen freeze, no BSOD) when the upgrade in placed in their machines.

I've swapped out the upgrades with an extra upgrade that we had, same issue.
I've swapped the RAM into different slots, machine boots and runs slowly....
I ran a T60 with just the RAM upgrade and not the system stick, no issues.
I ran CPU-z on one machine with just the factory RAM and one with just the upgrade RAM.
CAS, RAS2CAS, RAS Cycle Time, Bank Cycle all the same.
I moved the factory RAM into the second slot, system runs fine.

It sounds to me like the Kingston RAM just does not like the factory RAM installed, what am I missing here?

 

[Treripica]

One thing I found out after posting is that Lenovo's factory RAM module was made by Micron, and Kingston uses Micron chips as well.

So we have two modules made by different companies with the same chips. At this point, I'm seriously thinking that it is an OS issue dressed in hardware symptoms.

 

[brentpresley]

There are reports of incompatibilities with the Kingston modules and the entire T60 line all over thinkpads.com. I would avoid them like the plague and stick with Micron, Elpida, Samsung, and Nanya (those are the OEM brands for the T60 line).


It's not an OS issue. It's a timing issue w/ those modules.

I've worked on dozens of T60s. They simply don't like Kingston memory.