RAM causing inconsistent BIOS errors

MercilessKiller

Hey guys. Recently upgraded my RAM to:
Corsair 6400 (800mhz) 2 * 2048 sticks. 2.10V ver1.1

I also have an A-Bit Motherboard.

Now my previous lower speed ram worked fine. 4 sticks of 512 without any issues. With this RAM i have a STRANGE problem.

First of all I think the motherboard is a little faulty. On bootup it says "NO BIOS INSTALLED" and whatever changes made to the BIOS only stick for 1 reboot...

Next every now and then I'll start up my PC and just hear very loud long beeps with a long pause. The ABIT Error code is C1 and to do with memory.

When I take a stick out, it works absolutely fine. I then go into BIOS, change the memory voltage to manual, select 2.10 (it auto selects 2.00). Save changes, put the other stick back in, boots up fine!!!!!!!!!!!! Mostly...

Today even when I changed it, it wouldn't boot up at all.. I tried and tried and tried and... well.. then it worked!!!!

So very inconsistent, not sure why or whats happening.

Anyone any ideas? Cant afford to be sending parts off to get exchanged as exams in a couple of weeks haha!

Thanks

aliEnRIK

what are the OLD sticks exactly?

Browntoa

I take it you have checked the CMOS battery , small 10p sized battery on the motherboard as that failing cause it to forget things

have you looked for updated bios Firmware ??

http://www.abit.com.tw/page/uk/download/download_bios.php?pFUN_KEY=8000&pTITLE_IMG=/download/images/download.gif

MercilessKiller

Browntoa wrote: »

I take it you have checked the CMOS battery , small 10p sized battery on the motherboard as that failing cause it to forget things

have you looked for updated bios Firmware ??

http://www.abit.com.tw/page/uk/download/download_bios.php?pFUN_KEY=8000&pTITLE_IMG=/download/images/download.gif

I updated the BIOS firmware about a year ago yeh, but no change and didn't want to mess about with that too much as I believe it voids warranty! If it's a 1 year warranty mind, I'm out of it now anyway, but I still don't want to end up with a totally no working machine right now!

I haven't checked the battery to be honest. I wouldn't know what to check! I mean it's there... but that's as far as my battery troubleshooting goes!

The old ram was CM2x512 5400C4 4*512mb which works fine when I put it in.

Thanks

DatabaseError

replace the battery, set the voltage to the correct one and try again...if errors persist run one of the many memcheck utils (there's even one built into vista)

aliEnRIK

Id guess you need some 5400 ram chips for it to work fine

MercilessKiller

The motherboard definitely supports 800mhz ram... 100%

guess I'll replace the battery after my exams.. don't want to risk things like that until I don't NEED a working PC.

MercilessKiller

Well today I couldn't start it up with both sticks of RAM in. Even doing the BIOS voltage modification, i was getting the C4 error and the long beeps, even though the bios was holding the correct ram voltage. Starts up with 1 stick fine (either stick), so its not a memory problem...

This is VERY frustrating

DatabaseError

Changing the battery will take 5 minutes and cost under a fiver...you already know it's sot working (you need to keep entering bios info) change the thing...if problems persist it's then something else.
Fix the known problem before anything else, if the BIOS info is not staying between reboots, there's no reason to expect it to be uncorrupted all the time!

tomsutton529

you could be using too much ram per slot. you will have to see what the MOBO manual says about RAM, also make sure its the right type.

say if a machine will take upto 1gb in ram, it might not like 4 sticks of 256 but will work fine on 2 sticks of 512. its along that sort of line.