Question I need help! Question regarding RAM

[rqm222]

I have an HP Elitebook 820 G4 and earlier today I went to try to turn it on & it just wouldn't start up. The screen stayed black. But the keyboard light would flash on and off and so would the fan, the fan would spin for like 2 seconds stop then spin again for 2 seconds continuously like it kept trying to push itself to start up but just couldn't. I looked up possible issue & fixes on Google and YouTube and tried a couple of things, for instance, taking the battery out trying to start it and so forth then it came down to checking the RAM sticks. The instructions suggested testing them by removing one at a time & then trying to start it up with only one at a time, to see if one is malfunctioning or faulty. One of them would not only NOT start it up, but was making these loud weird beeping noises I have never heard before, like old old school computer "beep boop beep" type sounds. Then the other one would start up but showed a screen that read "POST configuration change prompts 2E1-Memory size error the system memory size is different from the last startup....etc etc... press enter to continue". So I'm assuming the first one that made the weird beeping sounds was the issue. So I decided to replace it with another RAM stick that I took out of my old ASUS laptop (screen broke on it). & When I started it up, it's giving me the same "POST configuration change prompts 2E1-Memory size error the system memory size is different from the last startup....etc etc... press enter to continue" message. My question(s), am I doing, or did I do the right thing here? & should I click "continue" on the "POST configuration change prompt 2E1-Memory size error" message?

Id really appreciate any help, suggestions, recommendations, references, advice or even opinions, I really don't care, I just want some type of response at this point. Thank you.

 

[Lafong]

Questions:

How old is the laptop?

Do you recall what you paid for it?

Do you have a known competent laptop repair outfit nearby?

If it cost 200 or more to fix it, would you do that? Or would you decline and replace it entirely?

 

[zinkles]

did you try pressing "continue"?

the "beep boop" sounds you heard were possible error codes. usually by counting how many beeps it gets (or long beep and short beeps) you can look up the error on the manufacturer website.

i assume one stick is faulty thus gave the beep error code.

replacing it with another stick from another laptop and pressing continue should continue. i assume it was waiting for user input prompt for the system to continue from POST. (POST is what the computer does before loading the OS to check if all components are working properly, and any changes are also monitored)

 

[rqm222]

No, that's what I wanted to know, if it'll be okay to "continue". I don't want to mess anything up if I do. I wanted a second opinion on it.

& I can't remember exactly how many "beep boops" there were, but there was a few that started off slow, then started going really fast, that's when I got freaked out & just shut it off! Lol

Okay, so I'll click "continue" & give an update on the results.

Thank you so much!