Identical RAM Sticks

airfighter90

Commendable
Oct 3, 2016
2
0
1,510
I just bought another set of G. SKILL Ripjaws DDR3 12800 (1600) RAM sticks 2x4GB (for a total of 16 Gb). Along with my other RAM the have identical CAS Latency and voltage. The only difference when they were bought. Also the RAM is being ran on a Z68 chipset gigabyte motherboard with Dual Channel memory so I decided to put the ram to corresponding color coded memory controllers, so the RAM bought in 2011 is in channel 1 and 3 and the new one is in channel 2 and 4.

Am I doing something wrong?

Any other ideas?

Some background info:
The computer seems to freeze randomly and does not proceed from this state. If it helps I was running world of warcraft and a couple videos on a two monitor set up when it happened.

Furthermore, prior to this I was getting all sorts of blue screens which seems to have stopped altogether after specifying the new channels for each coupled RAM sticks.

(All my drivers are up to date also I went one by one in the device manager and did this manually, because of BSOD issues, the reports for errors were all over the place, a different error with every BSOD.)

Any help?

Thank y'all in advance :).
 
G. Skill FAQs:
http://www.gskill.com/en/faq/DRAM_Memory

Q:
I want to install more memory, in addition to my existing memory kit. What are my options?

A:
We do not recommend mixing memory kits, regardless of brand or model.

By mixing memory kits together, there may be compatibility issues such as unable to boot or unable to operate at rated specifications.

Each of our memory kit are thoroughly tested to ensure compatibility within each memory kit. And because we have not tested our memory kit with your existing memory kit, we cannot guarantee compatibility when multiple kits are used.
 
Despite the same part numbers, they are not identical.
Ram is sold in kits for a reason.
A motherboard must manage all the ram using the same specs of voltage, cas and speed.
Ram from the same vendor and part number can be made up of differing manufacturing components over time.
Some motherboards can be very sensitive to this.
This is more difficult when 4 sticks are involved.
That is why ram vendors will NOT support ram that is not bought in one kit.

First, test each kit by themselves to confirm that they work. Memtest86+ is the gold standard.

Your only hope is to try upping the ram voltage in the bios before installing the second kit.

My recommendation is to return the second kit and buy a single matched kit of the capacity you need.
2 x 8gb is best.
Keep your old kit as a spare.
 
What I'm about to say might sound absurd, but bear with me.

First step, clear CMOS. Or revert BIOS back to factory settings and shut it down.

Try to remove all sticks and left 1 stick at slot 1. Start it up, see what happens.
Nothing gone wrong? Add another stick. Repeat this until all slot occupied.

Should you find a stick or a slot that doesn't work for some reason, the first thing you should do is to clean those copper connector on RAM stick and try place it again.
Still doesn't work? Then we can assume the slot/stick is the culprit.
 
I gotta say thank you to all of you who posted here. I appreciate all the time and the effort to write a well thought out explaination. I will most likely be returning the dimms and just buying a 2x8gb and call it a week. Thank you guys very much!!

As a side note I conducted the mem test and did what rush21hit recommended and it is indeed the dimms not properly working together.

Thanks again guys!