Spinning rainbow beach ball of frustration

shatzi56 said:

I recently tried to upgrade my imac 21.5" (mid 2010) to recommended Crucial 16 GB memory ( 2 8GB cards). It currently has 4GB (2 2GB cars) memory. I installed them into the two upper slots (closest to the screen). After several attempts at start up, I kept getting the following error message, "Your computer restarted because of a problem".

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Your iMac has 4 ram slots. Maximum ram for 2010 21" iMac's = 16gig. If you're going to upgrade it to 16gig…I would recommend getting 4 x 4gig sticks of ram. The 8gig sticks of ram you purchased may not be fully compatible.

Return the 2 x 8gig sticks of ram…and get 4 x 4gig.

- Nick

Hi Nick. Thanks for the quick feedback. Really appreciate it!! I had also spoken to a Crucial Tech representative and he asked me to try installing the 2 x 8GB memory cards in the upper slots and ALSO to install the original Apple 2 x 2GB memory cards in the lower slots. He told me that "technically" my iMac can run up to 32GB Ram. I will try that when I get home tonight. What are your thoughts on that? This would quickly resolve my issue if it works. I did see several articles in the past (when I was researching upgrading memory) that also stated that my mid 2010 iMac can run up to 32GB memory.

shatzi56 said:

I had also spoken to a Crucial Tech representative and he asked me to try installing the 2 x 8GB memory cards in the upper slots and ALSO to install the original Apple 2 x 2GB memory cards in the lower slots. He told me that "technically" my iMac can run up to 32GB Ram.

What are your thoughts on that?

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The 21" 2010 iMacs have a max ram of 16gig…and only SOME of the 2010 27" iMac's are capable of 32gig of ram. There is no "technically" with the 2010 21" iMac's. They are limited to 16gig of ram.

shatzi56 said:

I did see several articles in the past (when I was researching upgrading memory) that also stated that my mid 2010 iMac can run up to 32GB memory.

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Here's the deal. When ALL 2010 iMac's were released (obviously back in 2010)…all of them had a max ram of 16gig. At that time there were no 8gig sticks of ram. When 8gig sticks of ram became available…curious folks out there experimented to see how 8gig sticks of ram would work (compatibility) with 2010 iMac's…and they found that 8gig sticks of ram worked in some 2010 iMac models…and some not.

This sort of "experimentation" has been going on for years & years.

Here's the bottom line:

- 21" 2010 iMac's have a max ram of 16gig
- 27" 2010 iMac's with an i3 CPU have a max ram of 16gig
- 27" 2010 iMac's with an i5 or i7 CPU have a max ram of 32gig

Before you return the 2 x 8gig sticks of ram…you could try installing them one more time…BUT…remove the 2 x 2gig of ram first. As I'm sure you're aware…(2 x 8gig) + (2 x 2gig) = 20gig. 20gig is greater than 16gig (this iMac's max ram)…so the total of 20gig of ram could be causing an issue as well.

If after installing the 2 x 8gig of ram (only)…which is now a total of 16gig of installed ram. If the computer still has problems…then what we've proven is that a 2010 21" iMac cannot have 8gig sticks of ram installed. Thus return the 2 x 8gig ram…and get 4 x 4gig of ram (as recommended above).

- Nick

Thanks AGAIN Nick. It still isn't working , so I'm taking your advice and will return the 2 x 8GB's and order 4 x 4GB cards. Should receive it next week. Will let you know know the results. Thanks again.

shatzi56 said:

Thanks AGAIN Nick. It still isn't working , so I'm taking your advice and will return the 2 x 8GB's and order 4 x 4GB cards. Should receive it next week. Will let you know know the results. Thanks again.

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Good deal. Glad you tried the "experiment".

As I suspected…installing two 8gig sticks of ram simply aren't compatible with 2010 21" iMac's. If you REALLY wanted to experiment further (just out of curiosity)…you could install just one stick of the 8gig ram at a time. Try one stick by itself…then the other stick. I'm only suggesting this because…maybe one of the two 8gig sticks of ram may be defective…while the other one may be good. But if neither 8gig stick works (by itself)…then this just further proves that 8gig sticks of ram don't work in 2010 21" iMac's.

And by the way. Hopefully when you ONLY have the original 2 x 2gig of ram installed…everything is fine!

"Back in the day" (since we're talking a computer with a max ram of 16gig)…when 8gig sticks of ram were new (and expensive). It was always less expensive to purchase 4 x 4gig sticks of ram than 2 x 8gig sticks of ram…simply because 4 x 4gig sticks of ram were less expensive than 2 x 8gig sticks of ram. But when I check now…it seems that the price of both options is very close (thus no real cost savings).

But in this case with a 2010 21" iMac…there seems to be only one choice anyway (to install 16gig of ram)…and that's 4 x 4gig sticks of ram.

Please definitely let us know how things go.

Thanks,

- Nick

p.s. By the way. I wanted to mention that the technical person you spoke with was not 100% incorrect. SOME 2010 iMac's do have a max ram of 32gig. But these models are limited to 2010 27" iMac's (and only some of them can have 32gig of ram). I'm sure this person meant well. There are just too many Apple computer models out there to keep all these little details straight.

And with the 2010 iMac's…there may be even more details to be remembered.

If we were talking "mid-2011" iMac's. ALL OF THEM (21" and 27") have a max ram of 32gig.

As Nick says 16GB must be 4x4GB, and 32GB 4x8GB. Your iMac simply cannot handle the 8GB modules.