RAM upgrade giving me BSOD and constant crashes

madman1101

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Oct 22, 2017
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I'm upgrading an alienware x51r3. After upgrading the GPU everything was working well, so I decided i'd double my ram from 8gb to 16 and am running 2 sticks of the 8gb Anarchy. I've checked the voltage and frequency and am constantly getting various BSOD's. I've tried re-seating the sticks, swapping slots, everything. I can't seem to get it to a constant working state. Sometimes I'll get it working and then it'll crash when I'm doing nothing. any ideas for what might be doing wrong?
 
Solution
Adding extra memory is not guaranteed to work by memory manufacturers as the new memory has never been tested with the old memory. You are free to do your own compatibility testing however it may be more expensive doing trial and error testing than just using a single kit that is guaranteed.
 
Are the new sticks stable by themselves? I'd try and run memtest86 from a thumbdrive and see if your new memory is stable. -> https://www.memtest86.com/

Otherwise you might have an issue with your sticks of memory not working well together.
 


I can tell you it’s not a compatibility issue with the existing ram. I removed old ram before. If I’m misunderstanding your solution let me know

 


I think you might be. My thoughts are to cover all issues. When I get new memory I check the sticks by themselves in my system using memtest86 before I even boot into Windows or any other OS. If I am pairing them with other sticks I will then add the paired sticks and test them again using memtest86 (JEDEC first then XMP) and then and only if they pass will I run Windows with them together. Purchased memory is rarely DOA but when it is it can cause severe system stability issues.

When testing I test using 1 Pass. If I am overclocking or using XMP settings then I will run 2 or 3 passes.
 


I ran memtest and got 0 errors, but when i'm gaming i'll get BSOD's still. any ideas?
 


Well, Fixed it. took the ram back and went and bought a different style. I'm assuming it has to do with the frequency it runs at. the native was 2400 and was compatible at 2133. found one native at 2133
 
Solution