Recently starting building computers for a customer, using components
they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage (10?) of
motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping the MB puts
them in order, and so far the customer has not had any problem returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue, but also wondering how likely it is that my (experienced)
employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in the RAM.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:27:42 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

Recently starting building computers for a customer, using components
they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage (10?) of
motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping the MB puts
them in order, and so far the customer has not had any problem returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue, but also wondering how likely it is that my (experienced)
employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in the RAM.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

MB manufacturer?



--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:27:42 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

Recently starting building computers for a customer, using components
they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage (10?) of
motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping the MB puts
them in order, and so far the customer has not had any problem returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue, but also wondering how likely it is that my (experienced)
employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in the RAM.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

MB manufacturer?

MSI.

On 3/16/2011 11:03 PM, Smitty Two wrote:
In ,
Meat wrote:

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:27:42 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

Recently starting building computers for a customer, using components
they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage (10?) of
motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping the MB puts
them in order, and so far the customer has not had any problem returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue, but also wondering how likely it is that my (experienced)
employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in the RAM.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

MB manufacturer?

MSI.

They are usually good. I assume you try other RAM to make sure that you
are not using a marginal RAM device, right?

If it is an RoHS issue, I'd be very worried that it will happen as the
board age and heat cycle stresses build up over time.

--
I'm never going to grow up.

"PeterD" wrote in message
...
On 3/16/2011 11:03 PM, Smitty Two wrote:
In ,
Meat wrote:

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:27:42 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

Recently starting building computers for a customer, using components
they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage (10?) of
motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping the MB puts
them in order, and so far the customer has not had any problem
returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue, but also wondering how likely it is that my (experienced)
employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in the RAM.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

MB manufacturer?

MSI.

They are usually good. I assume you try other RAM to make sure that you
are not using a marginal RAM device, right?

If it is an RoHS issue, I'd be very worried that it will happen as the
board age and heat cycle stresses build up over time.

--
I'm never going to grow up.

Does he have an ESD problem?



tm

On Thu, 17 Mar 2011 12:28:07 -0400, tm wrote:

"PeterD" wrote in message
...
On 3/16/2011 11:03 PM, Smitty Two wrote:
In ,
Meat wrote:

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:27:42 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

Recently starting building computers for a customer, using
components they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage
(10?) of motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping
the MB puts them in order, and so far the customer has not had any
problem returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue, but also wondering how likely it is that my
(experienced) employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in
the RAM.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

MB manufacturer?

MSI.

They are usually good. I assume you try other RAM to make sure that you
are not using a marginal RAM device, right?

If it is an RoHS issue, I'd be very worried that it will happen as the
board age and heat cycle stresses build up over time.

--
I'm never going to grow up.

Does he have an ESD problem?



tm

I'd switch to Asus.



--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

In article nc,
JR North wrote:

Likely your tech is spiking the ram or slot contacts by not being
properly grounded to earth and the puter case. I never venture inside,
and especially never swap ram without being grounded first.
JR


Thanks for the suggestion, but ESD is not the issue.


Smitty Two wrote:
Recently starting building computers for a customer, using components
they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage (10?) of
motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping the MB puts
them in order, and so far the customer has not had any problem returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue, but also wondering how likely it is that my (experienced)
employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in the RAM.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:


I'd switch to Asus.

Not my call.

In article , PeterD
wrote:

On 3/16/2011 11:03 PM, Smitty Two wrote:
In ,
Meat wrote:

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:27:42 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

Recently starting building computers for a customer, using components
they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage (10?) of
motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping the MB puts
them in order, and so far the customer has not had any problem returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue, but also wondering how likely it is that my (experienced)
employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in the RAM.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

MB manufacturer?

MSI.

They are usually good. I assume you try other RAM to make sure that you
are not using a marginal RAM device, right?

Once the computers pass the single beep test and the visual inspection,
they are buttoned up and delivered. It's my customer who learns whether
there are issues with RAM or anything else beyond that. But I'm
reasonably sure that he's swapping the RAM stick before diagnosing the
"bad MB."


If it is an RoHS issue, I'd be very worried that it will happen as the
board age and heat cycle stresses build up over time.

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:27:42 -0700, Smitty Two
wrote:

Recently starting building computers for a customer, using components
they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage (10?) of
motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping the MB puts
them in order, and so far the customer has not had any problem returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

I haven't seen anything like that. However, I did have an unusual
problem when I purchased about 8 MSI motherboards from a distributor.
All the boards had a problem of some sort, but not all were identical,
which is usually the case with production defects. After some
investigation, I discovered that their shipping department had boxed
up and delivered the boards that were being returned by other
customers. This might be what's happening with the large number of
failures.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue,

Not that I know about. However, it's considered standard practice to
assign the blame before the problem is identified and fixed.

but also wondering how likely it is that my (experienced)
employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in the RAM.

Highly likely if he's using one set of RAM sticks to test the boards.
Unlikely if each board has its own set of RAM. Very unlikely if it's
the same slot that always craps out.

You might also check if the CPU is properly seated in its socket. That
has caused some similar (but not identical) problems.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

The model number of the MSI motherboard and the exact spec of the RAM
might have been helpful. Some motherboards are VERY picky about the
type and speed of RAM that they use. On the borderline devices, a
given SDRAM stick will barely work in one slot, and fail in others.
You might be dealing with such borderline situations. Numbers please.

--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

In article ,
Jeff Liebermann wrote:

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:27:42 -0700, Smitty Two
wrote:

Recently starting building computers for a customer, using components
they supply, and have run into an alarming percentage (10?) of
motherboards that fail to recognize one RAM slot. Swapping the MB puts
them in order, and so far the customer has not had any problem returning
the bad MBs for credit to his vendor.

I haven't seen anything like that. However, I did have an unusual
problem when I purchased about 8 MSI motherboards from a distributor.
All the boards had a problem of some sort, but not all were identical,
which is usually the case with production defects. After some
investigation, I discovered that their shipping department had boxed
up and delivered the boards that were being returned by other
customers. This might be what's happening with the large number of
failures.

Is this a known epidemic? RoHS associated? I'm not being faulted for
this issue,

Not that I know about. However, it's considered standard practice to
assign the blame before the problem is identified and fixed.

but also wondering how likely it is that my (experienced)
employee is damaging the RAM slots when he plugs in the RAM.

Highly likely if he's using one set of RAM sticks to test the boards.
Unlikely if each board has its own set of RAM. Very unlikely if it's
the same slot that always craps out.

You might also check if the CPU is properly seated in its socket. That
has caused some similar (but not identical) problems.

All reasoned feedback appreciated.

The model number of the MSI motherboard and the exact spec of the RAM
might have been helpful. Some motherboards are VERY picky about the
type and speed of RAM that they use. On the borderline devices, a
given SDRAM stick will barely work in one slot, and fail in others.
You might be dealing with such borderline situations. Numbers please.

Thanks for your detailed response. I am out of office until Monday and
will post back with further info then.

On 3/17/2011 10:24 PM, Smitty Two wrote:
In ,
wrote:

...

They are usually good. I assume you try other RAM to make sure that you
are not using a marginal RAM device, right?

Once the computers pass the single beep test and the visual inspection,
they are buttoned up and delivered. It's my customer who learns whether
there are issues with RAM or anything else beyond that. But I'm
reasonably sure that he's swapping the RAM stick before diagnosing the
"bad MB."


I would not assume that at all... I'd suggest trying to see if they can
confirm they did any diagnostics.

--
I'm never going to grow up.

On Thu, 17 Mar 2011 19:21:33 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:


I'd switch to Asus.

Not my call.

Been using Asus for more than a decade. Besides Super Micro, best boards
I've ever owned and I've used dozens or more building OEM machines.

MSI is cheap board, just pulled one out of a 3 year old eMachine and
replaced it with an Asus.

That's my call from 15 years of building experience.



--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

Been using Asus for more than a decade. Besides
Super Micro, best boards I've owned. I've used
dozens or more building OEM machines.

My machine uses an ASUS P4T, purchased in late 2001. Been running fine ever
since. My next desktop will have an ASUS board, and if I ever buy a
notebook, it will probably be an ASUS.

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:

On Thu, 17 Mar 2011 19:21:33 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:


I'd switch to Asus.

Not my call.

Been using Asus for more than a decade. Besides Super Micro, best boards
I've ever owned and I've used dozens or more building OEM machines.

MSI is cheap board, just pulled one out of a 3 year old eMachine and
replaced it with an Asus.

That's my call from 15 years of building experience.

All right, two votes for Asus. I'll suggest them to my customer, but I'm
going to have to be pretty gentle about it. Not all my customers welcome
design/engineering (or in this case parts specification) suggestions
from me. I'm just supposed to be the stupid guy who does what he's told.

On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 10:22:43 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:

On Thu, 17 Mar 2011 19:21:33 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:


I'd switch to Asus.

Not my call.

Been using Asus for more than a decade. Besides Super Micro, best
boards I've ever owned and I've used dozens or more building OEM
machines.

MSI is cheap board, just pulled one out of a 3 year old eMachine and
replaced it with an Asus.

That's my call from 15 years of building experience.

All right, two votes for Asus. I'll suggest them to my customer, but I'm
going to have to be pretty gentle about it. Not all my customers welcome
design/engineering (or in this case parts specification) suggestions
from me. I'm just supposed to be the stupid guy who does what he's told.

Hmmmm... I never had customers who didn't go with my hardware
suggestions. If they opposed my suggestions there simply were asked to go
elsewhere. I've been asked to build with the customer's hardware on a few
occasions, usually a friend of a friend. I made it very clear I would not
stand behind what I though were inferior products and they should have
consulted me prior to making purchases. I'm not insensitive to your
situation, I've been there.



--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 10:07:33 -0700, William Sommerwerck wrote:

Been using Asus for more than a decade. Besides Super Micro, best
boards I've owned. I've used dozens or more building OEM machines.

My machine uses an ASUS P4T, purchased in late 2001. Been running fine
ever since. My next desktop will have an ASUS board, and if I ever buy a
notebook, it will probably be an ASUS.

I had an Asus M6Ne built for me back in 2003. Let my son use it and he
managed to break a hinge. I repaired that a year ago. Only problem it has
is that if it overheats from the air ducts being blocked, it will freeze
if you are using Windows. Didn't do that with SuSE linux, go figure.
The battery is still in great shape. Lasts about 2 hours as it always did.
Centrino mobile M architecture. 1.8 ghz scaling P4.

Current desktop - Asus M4A78T-E. 8 gigs Cosair XMS3 4x2 DDR3 RAM FSB
running at 1.6 ghz. AMD PhenomII 955 quad core overclocked to 4 GHZ. Pair
of SLI connected eVGA GeForce 285 - 1 GB DDR3 HDR 128 bit floating point.

Stability is impeccable. Video encoding approaches 20x with NVidia CUDA
support. and hour of RAW DV encodes in minutes instead of hours. I have 3
Seagate 2TB internal drives not raid just JBOD. An external eSATA 2TB
servers as redundant storage for stuff that will reside on internal and
external media until it is processed onto Blu Ray. And you might think
this thing would howl like a microwave oven but that's not the case. In
fact it's quiet. Everything is installed in an Antec server case with two
redundant 650 watt PSUs.




--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

Stability is impeccable. Video encoding approaches 20x
with NVidia CUDA support. and hour of RAW DV encodes
in minutes instead of hours. I have 3 Seagate 2TB internal
drives -- not raid, just JBOD.

Just Back up Once Daily? I back up everything every two weeks or so to a
bootable drive. Critical stuff is backed up to a Zip every time a major
change is made.


You might think this thing would howl like a microwave oven,
but that's not the case. [Ouch!] In fact, it's quiet. Everything is
installed in an Antec server case with redundant 650W PSUs.

Some time ago I switched from roller-bearing to ball-bearing fans. Big
difference.

All right, two votes for Asus. I'll suggest them to my
customer, but I'm going to have to be pretty gentle
about it. Not all my customers welcome design/
engineering (or in this case parts specification)
suggestions from me. I'm just supposed to be the
stupid guy who does what he's told.

Until something goes wrong and /you're/ held responsible.

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:

On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 10:22:43 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:

On Thu, 17 Mar 2011 19:21:33 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:


I'd switch to Asus.

Not my call.

Been using Asus for more than a decade. Besides Super Micro, best
boards I've ever owned and I've used dozens or more building OEM
machines.

MSI is cheap board, just pulled one out of a 3 year old eMachine and
replaced it with an Asus.

That's my call from 15 years of building experience.

All right, two votes for Asus. I'll suggest them to my customer, but I'm
going to have to be pretty gentle about it. Not all my customers welcome
design/engineering (or in this case parts specification) suggestions
from me. I'm just supposed to be the stupid guy who does what he's told.

Hmmmm... I never had customers who didn't go with my hardware
suggestions. If they opposed my suggestions there simply were asked to go
elsewhere. I've been asked to build with the customer's hardware on a few
occasions, usually a friend of a friend. I made it very clear I would not
stand behind what I though were inferior products and they should have
consulted me prior to making purchases. I'm not insensitive to your
situation, I've been there.

I do some product design, but the bulk of my business is assembly work,
and I've lost customers by making suggestions that offended someone. In
this case, I get paid whether the MB RAM slots work or not, and I get
paid again to replace the bad MBs, so it's not really in my best
interest to make an issue of component selection or tell the customer to
go elsewhere. If I put in all the parts correctly and get the single
beep, the invoice goes out. I do not install OS or hook computer up to a
monitor. Customer does that and assumes responsibility for the thing.

Still, if I can improve the reliability of his product, I might gain
some respect. Just have to put on my best diplomacy suit with this guy,
because he loves to micro-manage.

On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 11:48:18 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

Stability is impeccable. Video encoding approaches 20x
with NVidia CUDA support. and hour of RAW DV encodes
in minutes instead of hours. I have 3 Seagate 2TB internal
drives -- not raid, just JBOD.

Just Back up Once Daily? I back up everything every two weeks or so to a
bootable drive. Critical stuff is backed up to a Zip every time a major
change is made.

Just a Bunch Of Disks

http://pc.wikia.com/wiki/JBOD

On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 12:08:34 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:

On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 10:22:43 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:

On Thu, 17 Mar 2011 19:21:33 -0700, Smitty Two wrote:

In article ,
Meat Plow wrote:


I'd switch to Asus.

Not my call.

Been using Asus for more than a decade. Besides Super Micro, best
boards I've ever owned and I've used dozens or more building OEM
machines.

MSI is cheap board, just pulled one out of a 3 year old eMachine and
replaced it with an Asus.

That's my call from 15 years of building experience.

All right, two votes for Asus. I'll suggest them to my customer, but
I'm going to have to be pretty gentle about it. Not all my customers
welcome design/engineering (or in this case parts specification)
suggestions from me. I'm just supposed to be the stupid guy who does
what he's told.

Hmmmm... I never had customers who didn't go with my hardware
suggestions. If they opposed my suggestions there simply were asked to
go elsewhere. I've been asked to build with the customer's hardware on
a few occasions, usually a friend of a friend. I made it very clear I
would not stand behind what I though were inferior products and they
should have consulted me prior to making purchases. I'm not insensitive
to your situation, I've been there.

I do some product design, but the bulk of my business is assembly work,
and I've lost customers by making suggestions that offended someone. In
this case, I get paid whether the MB RAM slots work or not, and I get
paid again to replace the bad MBs, so it's not really in my best
interest to make an issue of component selection or tell the customer to
go elsewhere. If I put in all the parts correctly and get the single
beep, the invoice goes out. I do not install OS or hook computer up to a
monitor. Customer does that and assumes responsibility for the thing.

Still, if I can improve the reliability of his product, I might gain
some respect. Just have to put on my best diplomacy suit with this guy,
because he loves to micro-manage.

Well you're in a totally different situation than I. But I could not in
good faith allow equipment that I knew was faulty in some way even
thought it didn't affect its pre-designed use in your case, one of say
three ram slots didn't work. That usually comes back to bit you in the ass
sooner or later.



--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 11:48:18 -0700, William Sommerwerck wrote:

Stability is impeccable. Video encoding approaches 20x with NVidia CUDA
support. and hour of RAW DV encodes in minutes instead of hours. I have
3 Seagate 2TB internal drives -- not raid, just JBOD.

Just Back up Once Daily? I back up everything every two weeks or so to a
bootable drive. Critical stuff is backed up to a Zip every time a major
change is made.

Things in the work are stored on internal and external. Dual redundancy
hasn't let me down yet. I don't give a **** about the operating system,
that can be installed and back to work in an hour. I try my best to
finish videos for customers as soon as possible, once they are on optical
media I delete the data but I do keep configuration files. Those go to my
storage server that backs up every morning at 3am. Basically just copies
the main disc to a hidden disc of the same size. Main disc fails and the
server does a failover and send me an email.


You might think this thing would howl like a microwave oven, but that's
not the case. [Ouch!] In fact, it's quiet. Everything is installed in
an Antec server case with redundant 650W PSUs.

Some time ago I switched from roller-bearing to ball-bearing fans. Big
difference.

I've never seen a roller bearing fan. Just the old bronze block bearing
impregnated with lube and roller. I use 120mm JMC Datatech roller bearing
fans. The newer design has contoured blades to reduce noise and increase
airflow. Kind of like the Fan blades of a RR Trent 900 turbofan.



--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 13:17:57 -0700, Mike Paff wrote:

On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 11:48:18 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

Stability is impeccable. Video encoding approaches 20x with NVidia
CUDA support. and hour of RAW DV encodes in minutes instead of hours.
I have 3 Seagate 2TB internal drives -- not raid, just JBOD.

Just Back up Once Daily? I back up everything every two weeks or so to a
bootable drive. Critical stuff is backed up to a Zip every time a major
change is made.

Just a Bunch Of Disks

Heh didn't catch that. Old SCSI term for drives on the controller that
weren't configured for a RAID container.



--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

In article ,
Jeff Liebermann wrote:

The model number of the MSI motherboard and the exact spec of the RAM
might have been helpful. Some motherboards are VERY picky about the
type and speed of RAM that they use. On the borderline devices, a
given SDRAM stick will barely work in one slot, and fail in others.
You might be dealing with such borderline situations. Numbers please.

Sorry about the delay in getting back to you on this. I'm not
experienced with component specs, so this may not even be enough to go
on, but the only info on the boxes is:

motherboard: MSI X58 Pro-E
RAM: Corsair "Dominator" DDR3. Using 3x 2GB sticks.

On Tue, 29 Mar 2011 21:43:47 -0700, Smitty Two
wrote:

In article ,
Jeff Liebermann wrote:

The model number of the MSI motherboard and the exact spec of the RAM
might have been helpful. Some motherboards are VERY picky about the
type and speed of RAM that they use. On the borderline devices, a
given SDRAM stick will barely work in one slot, and fail in others.
You might be dealing with such borderline situations. Numbers please.

Sorry about the delay in getting back to you on this. I'm not
experienced with component specs, so this may not even be enough to go
on, but the only info on the boxes is:

motherboard: MSI X58 Pro-E
RAM: Corsair "Dominator" DDR3. Using 3x 2GB sticks.

Are you overclocking the CPU speed?
What is the speed rating of the DDR3 RAM? It should be PC3-?????

Corsair "Dominator" RAM series is the favored RAM for overclocking
adventures. They even advertise it.
http://www.corsair.com/memory/dominator.html
As I recall, when I tore apart one of their DDR2 sticks, it's Intel
chips, with a useless aluminum heat sink attached mostly for
aesthetics. The sticks are then selected for speeds somewhat above
the DDR3 specification. Note that similar looking sticks are bin
sorted by speed. You may be using rejects, or a mix of speeds. Little
wonder you're having fallout. If overclocked, don't be surprised if
you get complaints of hangs and spontaneous reboots in the field. If
running a speed mix, you could be seeing combinations that won't work.

I've had limited experience with DDR3 motherboards, and none with the
above combination. I have had some experience with PIII and P4
vintage MSI (MicroStar International) motherboards and find them to be
near the low end in quality. However, this board:
http://www.msi.com/product/mb/X58-Pro-E.html
uses all polymer electrolytic capacitors, so there a good chance it
will survive the warranty period. However, that's no indication
layout and design quality, neither of which MSI is known for. I can't
tell from the "detailed" specs if overclocking is supported. It
proclaims:
Supports six unbuffered DIMM of 1.5 Volt DDR3 800/1066/1333*/1600*
(OC) DRAM, 24GB Max
I'll assume that the Corsair RAM is running at 1600MT/s, which is well
under their tested speed, so it should work. However, if the
motherboard is set overlocked, it might not.



--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 08:50:30 -0700, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

On Tue, 29 Mar 2011 21:43:47 -0700, Smitty Two
wrote:

In article ,
Jeff Liebermann wrote:

The model number of the MSI motherboard and the exact spec of the RAM
might have been helpful. Some motherboards are VERY picky about the
type and speed of RAM that they use. On the borderline devices, a
given SDRAM stick will barely work in one slot, and fail in others.
You might be dealing with such borderline situations. Numbers please.

Sorry about the delay in getting back to you on this. I'm not
experienced with component specs, so this may not even be enough to go
on, but the only info on the boxes is:

motherboard: MSI X58 Pro-E
RAM: Corsair "Dominator" DDR3. Using 3x 2GB sticks.

Are you overclocking the CPU speed?
What is the speed rating of the DDR3 RAM? It should be PC3-?????

Corsair "Dominator" RAM series is the favored RAM for overclocking
adventures. They even advertise it.
http://www.corsair.com/memory/dominator.html As I recall, when I tore
apart one of their DDR2 sticks, it's Intel chips, with a useless
aluminum heat sink attached mostly for aesthetics. The sticks are then
selected for speeds somewhat above the DDR3 specification. Note that
similar looking sticks are bin sorted by speed. You may be using
rejects, or a mix of speeds. Little wonder you're having fallout. If
overclocked, don't be surprised if you get complaints of hangs and
spontaneous reboots in the field. If running a speed mix, you could be
seeing combinations that won't work.

I've had limited experience with DDR3 motherboards, and none with the
above combination. I have had some experience with PIII and P4 vintage
MSI (MicroStar International) motherboards and find them to be near the
low end in quality. However, this board:
http://www.msi.com/product/mb/X58-Pro-E.html uses all polymer
electrolytic capacitors, so there a good chance it will survive the
warranty period. However, that's no indication layout and design
quality, neither of which MSI is known for. I can't tell from the
"detailed" specs if overclocking is supported. It proclaims:
Supports six unbuffered DIMM of 1.5 Volt DDR3 800/1066/1333*/1600*
(OC) DRAM, 24GB Max
I'll assume that the Corsair RAM is running at 1600MT/s, which is well
under their tested speed, so it should work. However, if the
motherboard is set overlocked, it might not.

Jeff here is my current machine:

Corsair XMS3 4GB PC12800 DDR3 Dual Channel 1600Mhz
AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition AM3
ASUS M4A78T-E AMD 790GX Socket AM3
ULTRA LS600 600W ATX POWER SUPPLY

Built in July 2010. Ran for a month at standard CPU clock.
Upped 3.2 to 4 ghz in August 2010

Dual boot Mandriva 2010 Power Pack server kernel
# uname -r
2.6.31.13-server-1mnb

Windows 7 Ultimate.

Zero problems/anomalies. Rarely use the Windows 7 anymore but had
same stability in Manddriva 2010 and Win 7.

Asus M4A78T-E is the overclocker's choice because of all the
timing and core syncing features.

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=2379

--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 16:24:32 +0000 (UTC), Meat Plow
wrote:

Jeff here is my current machine:

Corsair XMS3 4GB PC12800 DDR3 Dual Channel 1600Mhz
AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition AM3
ASUS M4A78T-E AMD 790GX Socket AM3
ULTRA LS600 600W ATX POWER SUPPLY

OK. I'm jealous. I know overclocking can be made to work, especially
if the manufacturers of the board and RAM underspecify their maximum
speeds. So far, there's no evidence that the MSI motherboard was
overclocked, so I'm speculating as to the culprit.

Built in July 2010. Ran for a month at standard CPU clock.
Upped 3.2 to 4 ghz in August 2010

Dual boot Mandriva 2010 Power Pack server kernel
# uname -r
2.6.31.13-server-1mnb

Have you run Prime95 (Win) or MBench (Linux) benchmark to see if you
can kill it? I use that as my QA test for overkill machines.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prime95
http://www.mersenne.org/freesoft/
I've seen stock non-overclocked hang or overheat running this.

Windows 7 Ultimate.

Zero problems/anomalies. Rarely use the Windows 7 anymore but had
same stability in Manddriva 2010 and Win 7.

Asus M4A78T-E is the overclocker's choice because of all the
timing and core syncing features.

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=2379

Nice. One of these days, in my non-existent spare time, I'll build
myself a high end machine. Thanks for the pointers.

--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 11:33:49 -0700, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 16:24:32 +0000 (UTC), Meat Plow
wrote:

Jeff here is my current machine:

Corsair XMS3 4GB PC12800 DDR3 Dual Channel 1600Mhz AMD Phenom II X4 955
Black Edition AM3 ASUS M4A78T-E AMD 790GX Socket AM3
ULTRA LS600 600W ATX POWER SUPPLY

OK. I'm jealous. I know overclocking can be made to work, especially
if the manufacturers of the board and RAM underspecify their maximum
speeds. So far, there's no evidence that the MSI motherboard was
overclocked, so I'm speculating as to the culprit.

Built in July 2010. Ran for a month at standard CPU clock. Upped 3.2 to
4 ghz in August 2010

Dual boot Mandriva 2010 Power Pack server kernel # uname -r
2.6.31.13-server-1mnb

Have you run Prime95 (Win) or MBench (Linux) benchmark to see if you can
kill it? I use that as my QA test for overkill machines.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prime95
http://www.mersenne.org/freesoft/
I've seen stock non-overclocked hang or overheat running this.

I've run several raw digital videos back to back encoding them to DVD
but even at 10x encode rate I can't get the CPU load up to more than 50%.
Not even enough load to speed the CPU fan up past 1800 which is still an
idle speed.

Don't really need to burn anything in or force a failure artificially. I
might do that if there was a problem.

Windows 7 Ultimate.

Zero problems/anomalies. Rarely use the Windows 7 anymore but had same
stability in Manddriva 2010 and Win 7.

Asus M4A78T-E is the overclocker's choice because of all the timing and
core syncing features.

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=2379

Nice. One of these days, in my non-existent spare time, I'll build
myself a high end machine. Thanks for the pointers.


$500 got all three items. Probably lots cheaper now Already had an Antec
server case. Has a 120mm fan in back and a vent tube the size of the CPU
fan with access to the
side case so the CPU draws its own fresh air in. The tube covers the top
of CPU fan. I thought it was a great idea.

It's a quiet machine also. Rubber mounted hard drives x3. The case has
sound dampening on the sides and a locking cover for the drive bay. I
can't handle a loud PC.


--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 18:56:09 +0000 (UTC), Meat Plow
wrote:

I've run several raw digital videos back to back encoding them to DVD
but even at 10x encode rate I can't get the CPU load up to more than 50%.
Not even enough load to speed the CPU fan up past 1800 which is still an
idle speed.

Nice, but depending upon how you're running that test, the CPU could
be waiting for HD I/O, which might explain why it's at 50% idle. Try
a CPU and/or RAM only benchmark to see how your overclocking is doing.

Don't really need to burn anything in or force a failure artificially. I
might do that if there was a problem.

Awwww.... you're no fun.

Nice. One of these days, in my non-existent spare time, I'll build
myself a high end machine. Thanks for the pointers.

$500 got all three items. Probably lots cheaper now Already had an Antec
server case. Has a 120mm fan in back and a vent tube the size of the CPU
fan with access to the
side case so the CPU draws its own fresh air in. The tube covers the top
of CPU fan. I thought it was a great idea.

I've seen a few boxes with fans like that. They work quite well for
cooling the CPU, but seems to require a 2nd fan to cool the rest of
the system. I've seen video cards that suck almost as much power as
the CPU. $500 for all that is cheap, even with todays prices.

It's a quiet machine also. Rubber mounted hard drives x3. The case has
sound dampening on the sides and a locking cover for the drive bay. I
can't handle a loud PC.

I have the same problem. I *HATE* noisy machines. About 2 years ago,
I went on a noise reduction purge and replaced my office and home
computers with Dell Optiplex 960 and 755 mini-tower machines
respectively. Both use a single 120mm fan for cooling. No other fans
in the box. The fan normally rotates quite slowly, which makes it
very quiet. When I run Bench95 to heat up the CPU, the fan gets quite
noisy. At full speed, it could probably lift the PC off the table.

No shock mounting on the hard disk drives. If there was enough noise
and/or vibration to warrant a shock mount, I would also suspect that
the drive was off balance or ready to blow. Some boxes allow the side
to act as a sounding board for the drive noises, which I guess
justifies sound dampening. I've done as well with stiffeners,
battens, and fiberglass matting on the sides.

Incidentally, I once had a PC (PIII/866) that had no fans. It used
heat pipes, liquid coolant, and a small aquarium pump to move the heat
to outside of the box. Worked nice until I found anti-freeze all over
the carpet.

More recently, I spent some time playing with two "no-fan" ATX power
supplies. This was one
http://www.fspgroupusa.com/zen-400/p/412.html
but I don't recall the other model. It had a big copper heat sink
sticking out the back of the machine. I burned myself several times
during testing. Both worked, but with limitations. The Zen-400 would
accumulate heat inside the case, between the top of the case and the
power supply. No air flow in that area would make the top rather hot.
The other would probably scorch anything that came in contact with the
copper heat sink. Meltdown and fire is a small price to pay for a
quiet PC.

--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558
# http://802.11junk.com
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 08:50:30 -0700 Jeff Liebermann
wrote in Message id: :

Corsair "Dominator" RAM series is the favored RAM for overclocking
adventures. They even advertise it.
http://www.corsair.com/memory/dominator.html
As I recall, when I tore apart one of their DDR2 sticks, it's Intel
chips, with a useless aluminum heat sink attached mostly for
aesthetics.

Huh? I believe Intel stopped making DRAM back in the 80's.

On Thu, 31 Mar 2011 05:15:41 -0400, JW wrote:

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 08:50:30 -0700 Jeff Liebermann
wrote in Message id: :

Corsair "Dominator" RAM series is the favored RAM for overclocking
adventures. They even advertise it.
http://www.corsair.com/memory/dominator.html
As I recall, when I tore apart one of their DDR2 sticks, it's Intel
chips, with a useless aluminum heat sink attached mostly for
aesthetics.

Huh? I believe Intel stopped making DRAM back in the 80's.

Y'er right. I recall seeing Intel markings on the chips, but that was
a few months ago, I was in a hurry, etc. I may have been mistaken.
I'll see if I can find a Corsair DDR3 stick and look inside. Randomly
skimming through the Intel validated RAM lists, I couldn't find
Corsair:
http://www.intel.com/technology/memory/

Some Googling didn't find any references to the chip vendor(s) for
Corsair RAM. The apparently were using Elpida RAM:
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/hardware/corsair-pulls-dominator-gt-ddr3-memory-because-of-failures/4886
but were having problems 2 years ago.
Oh-oh... perhaps old stock DDR3 RAM?



--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 16:57:48 -0700, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 18:56:09 +0000 (UTC), Meat Plow
wrote:

I've run several raw digital videos back to back encoding them to DVD
but even at 10x encode rate I can't get the CPU load up to more than
50%. Not even enough load to speed the CPU fan up past 1800 which is
still an idle speed.

Nice, but depending upon how you're running that test, the CPU could be
waiting for HD I/O, which might explain why it's at 50% idle. Try a CPU
and/or RAM only benchmark to see how your overclocking is doing.

It's not idling at 50%. That's the highest CPU load that I can manage
with the video software. Actually any software I have. My video card
is pre-CUDA support else-wise CPU load would be less than 50%.

Don't really need to burn anything in or force a failure artificially. I
might do that if there was a problem.

Awwww.... you're no fun.

Yeah I know. No need to heat the soup up unless it's time to eat.

Nice. One of these days, in my non-existent spare time, I'll build
myself a high end machine. Thanks for the pointers.

$500 got all three items. Probably lots cheaper now Already had an Antec
server case. Has a 120mm fan in back and a vent tube the size of the CPU
fan with access to the
side case so the CPU draws its own fresh air in. The tube covers the top
of CPU fan. I thought it was a great idea.

I've seen a few boxes with fans like that. They work quite well for
cooling the CPU, but seems to require a 2nd fan to cool the rest of the
system. I've seen video cards that suck almost as much power as the
CPU. $500 for all that is cheap, even with todays prices.

The side vent has a tube you can adjust over the CPU cooler. And flairs
at the end so it covers the cooler inside. Just wanted to make sure I
stated that correctly. Sometimes my descriptions suck. There is an
aditional PCM controlled 120mm fan mounted under the PSU on the real
panel The PSU has a load controlled 120mm fan.

It's a quiet machine also. Rubber mounted hard drives x3. The case has
sound dampening on the sides and a locking cover for the drive bay. I
can't handle a loud PC.

I have the same problem. I *HATE* noisy machines. About 2 years ago, I
went on a noise reduction purge and replaced my office and home
computers with Dell Optiplex 960 and 755 mini-tower machines
respectively. Both use a single 120mm fan for cooling. No other fans
in the box. The fan normally rotates quite slowly, which makes it very
quiet. When I run Bench95 to heat up the CPU, the fan gets quite noisy.

Yeah the Dell desktops both home and office versions always used a
large slow rotating fan with a shroud over the CPU. Made them popular
for being quiet.

At full speed, it could probably lift the PC off the table.
No shock mounting on the hard disk drives. If there was enough noise
and/or vibration to warrant a shock mount, I would also suspect that the
drive was off balance or ready to blow. Some boxes allow the side to
act as a sounding board for the drive noises, which I guess justifies
sound dampening. I've done as well with stiffeners, battens, and
fiberglass matting on the sides.

The screws for the hard drives go through a silicone grommet. All drives
make some noise and there's space in this case for 4. I have a mini ATX
case that I used with 1 drive prior to building this. You could hear the
drive spin and click. This case with 3 drives you cannot unless you hold
your ear up to the front.

Incidentally, I once had a PC (PIII/866) that had no fans. It used heat
pipes, liquid coolant, and a small aquarium pump to move the heat to
outside of the box. Worked nice until I found anti-freeze all over the
carpet.

More recently, I spent some time playing with two "no-fan" ATX power
supplies. This was one
http://www.fspgroupusa.com/zen-400/p/412.html but I don't recall the
other model. It had a big copper heat sink sticking out the back of the
machine. I burned myself several times during testing. Both worked,
but with limitations. The Zen-400 would accumulate heat inside the
case, between the top of the case and the power supply. No air flow in
that area would make the top rather hot. The other would probably scorch
anything that came in contact with the copper heat sink. Meltdown and
fire is a small price to pay for a quiet PC.

I used to offer a micro pc to clients. It had no fans either. Sold a few
of them but they weren't upgradeable.

My son has a Intel P4 @ 3ghz. Has a large PCM fan on the CPU. Pretty
quiet most of the time unless he's playing a game. The CPU fan ramps
up and down with the load of the game. It will whine when the heatsink
gets clogged with dust. Can definitely tell when it's time to detatch the
fan and brush and vacuum it out. The maker anticipated this and the fan
is latched on, easy to remove to clean. It's been long enough now for
this one to get its first cleaning. I've cleaned the side vent off
several times as dust gathers rather quickly over the inlet. It's not a
screen but a circle of closely drilled small holes.




--
Live Fast Die Young, Leave A Pretty Corpse

In article ,
Jeff Liebermann wrote:

Are you overclocking the CPU speed?
What is the speed rating of the DDR3 RAM? It should be PC3-?????

well, I'm not doing anything with the dang computers other than putting
them together. I'm pretty sure the customer isn't overclocking them.

I'll try to rustle up some more specs on the RAM.