Question System not booting with second stick of RAM

[Quwyn232]

So about a year ago I decided to replace the thermal paste on the GPU and CPU, all seemed to go fine until booting the system back up, which it would not do. I finally managed to get it working with only a single slot of RAM of my pair in, it didn't matter which one of the pair it was or in which slot, one alone would work and not the two.
Out of fear of breaking my system any more I left it alone and went on with a single 8GB stick, but am not getting to the point (and confidence which took a hit) to try and get back up to 16.
As such anyone who has any advice on if it would just be a RAM issue and if so either hardware or software, or a possible issue from when I removed the CPU and placed it back in (I don't think I damaged any of the pins, and the system has been running fine for a year), or anything else.

2 sticks off DDR4 Vengeance LPX 3600
Core i7 6700k
Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 7

 

[Lutfij]

You should inspect the CPU socket for any bent and/or broken pins. That's the first place to look. Second would be to see if you've managed to get some thermal paste into the ram slots(by accident). Third would be to see if you can get into BIOS and see what BIOS version you're currently on. Following that visit MSIs support site and see if you have any BIOS updates pending.

How old is the PSU in your build? Speaking of build, you need to list the rest of your specs as well, including the storage, PSU and the case. Which slots are occupying the motherboard's ram slots?

You could try and disconnect from the wall and monitor, press and hold down power button and then remove CMOS battery before replacing it after 30 minutes.

 

[Quwyn232]

The pin answer was my worse case wanting to hear, last thing I really want to be doing is taking that back up again But yeah I guess that might be the answer in the end.

Storage is a 250GB SSD and a 4TB Main
Power is a EV3A 850G2

Single stick of ram sitting in the 4th slot, so the one furthest away from the CPU.

https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-Z170X-Gaming-7-rev-10#ov

Sorry I dont know how to get it into a single list automatically.

As I said the system was running fine with 16GB before and is now happily ticking over with 8, I dont know if that is just me being wishful the issue isnt the chip so I dont have to remove it.

 

[Quwyn232]

So having had a little poke around, I checked both sticks of ram separately in slot 1, which on my board is red and furthest away from the CPU and both worked. Then however in any combo together of both in red or both in black the system will spin up and then after about 10 second will just shut back down again before trying to spin up again.
Anyone got any thoughts on what that could be before I do the bit I dont want to do and play around with the CPU?