Installed Ram

i just finished throwing in two gigs of ram into my macbook. it was pretty quick and easy. after starting it up everything ran fine and it detected the 2gb of ram. after about 5 minutes of surfing the web the computer froze up and i got a message saying that it needs to restart. it restarted, but was running sluggish for a few minutes. so i shut it down, opened it up to check if the ram was seated properly or anything else that might cause concern. after verifying that everything appeared to be good i started it up again and as of now it seems to be running fine. the ram is still detected, but should i be a little concerned about the forced restart?? i bought the ram from crucial so there is a warranty.

G'day hairlesswookiee,

I just did the exact same as you, bought 1Gb X 2 Ram sticks from Crucial. I had no issues and continue to have no issues since I installed them 4 days ago.

If anything it may be slighly premature to ask whether or not there is a potential problem on the horizon for your MacBook. While I can understand the worry about installing the new RAM and wanting everything to go smoothly, your forced restart could just be nothing to worry about.

Just keep an eye on things and report back with any symptoms which you think might be related to the upgrade. You did the right thing in checking that the RAM was properly seated so I would just continue as normal but be watchful at the same time.

Hope this helps...

and once you're sure you're keeping it, update the specs in your profile...

ok, it just did it again about 30 minutes ago. i was running itunes, adium, and word then all of a sudden i had to force restart again, but it didn't restart. i couldn't get the computer running again until just a few seconds ago. should i send the ram back, take it to the apple store for inspection or what??? i know crucial has a warranty, but did i void the apple warranty by installing the ram myself?? i'm gonna go read up on the warranty issues when i get home, but this is really starting to worry me now.

There's a memory test you can try. I don't know how good it is, but I've attached a graphic copy of a page from the PDF version of the MacBook Users Guide.

Hope this helps!

Installing more RAM is indeed considered as a user installable part so it doesn't void the warranty.

I found this at Apple Support, Apple Warranty: Installing Memory, Expansion Cards, User Installable Parts Does Not Void Warranty.

I would contact Crucial and tell them about this. They should replace the faulty RAM.

Here is how I would go about troubleshooting the RAM I would put the lappie back to how it was and see if you still have the problem. If not maybe it's the RAM then I would put one stick in at a time and see how it behaves. Software RAM testers are ok but not entirely reliable. There are hardware testers and they are better but would cost you more than replacing the ram. Sometimes you have to test ram for days to find an error.

Of course your mileage may very.

Cheers

snather said:

Here is how I would go about troubleshooting the RAM I would put the lappie back to how it was and see if you still have the problem. If not maybe it's the RAM then I would put one stick in at a time and see how it behaves. Software RAM testers are ok but not entirely reliable. There are hardware testers and they are better but would cost you more than replacing the ram. Sometimes you have to test ram for days to find an error.

Of course your mileage may very.

Cheers

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yeah i'm gonna do this when i get home. it just happened again while watching a movie at work. IMO it most definitely has to be the ram. since i installed it friday i've had to restart several times while using various multiple programs. last night i left it running while i jumped in the shower and when i came out it froze while the screen saver was running. this sucks because i was really hoping to have a juiced up macbook, and now i'm afraid i'm gonna get the run-around with getting the ram replaced. several people have commented on how reliable Crucial memory is, but now i'm just a little skeptical as i sent them an email friday in the early afternoon and have yet to hear back from them.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=13946

I feel uneasy that Apple fail to mention 3rd Party RAM here ...

hairlesswookiee said:

yeah i'm gonna do this when i get home. it just happened again while watching a movie at work. IMO it most definitely has to be the ram. since i installed it friday i've had to restart several times while using various multiple programs. last night i left it running while i jumped in the shower and when i came out it froze while the screen saver was running. this sucks because i was really hoping to have a juiced up macbook, and now i'm afraid i'm gonna get the run-around with getting the ram replaced. several people have commented on how reliable Crucial memory is, but now i'm just a little skeptical as i sent them an email friday in the early afternoon and have yet to hear back from them.

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I had heard they were the best! This is a total letdown for me too so I will stop recommending them to people who ask about RAM from now on... And that's not terribly cool of them to ignore your email like that either. :radioacti

MacHeadCase said:

I had heard they were the best! This is a total letdown for me too so I will stop recommending them to people who ask about RAM from now on... And that's not terribly cool of them to ignore your email like that either. :radioacti

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well let's not jump the gun too soon. it was friday to be honest i didn't expect a reply over the weekend anyways. i was just fumed because my laptop wasn't happy. as long as i get something from them today i'll be pretty happy.

~~btw, how much does Apple charge for their 2gb of ram?? i was looking at their site last night just to see what other options i might have and i kept finding prices in the $300 range. do they really overcharge by that much??

If you boot the hardware test on your CD, you can do a full memory test using that.

I'd recommend you run the test and see if you run into errors.
But it does really sound like bad RAM.

Have them replace it and give it another try. They are usually pretty reliable, but nobody's 100% perfect.

(To run the hardware test, insert the first DVD that came with your macbook and hold down 'D' at the chime).

Aptmunich said:

If you boot the hardware test on your CD, you can do a full memory test using that.

I'd recommend you run the test and see if you run into errors.
But it does really sound like bad RAM.

Have them replace it and give it another try. They are usually pretty reliable, but nobody's 100% perfect.

(To run the hardware test, insert the first DVD that came with your macbook and hold down 'D' at the chime).

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thanks, i tried it twice yesterday and it came up with nothing both times. i just put in the original ram so hopefully it will run better than it did before.

hairlesswookiee said:

thanks, i tried it twice yesterday and it came up with nothing both times. i just put in the original ram so hopefully it will run better than it did before.

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Well, definitely good luck. It probably is the new ram, and will appear to test fine unless you have hardware specifically designed to test ram. I hate transient errors. neye:

well im 100% sure its the Ram. after re-installing the factory modules it has been running perfect for over 2 1/2 hours now. i'm at school burning a CD and its as good as it was the day it came home with me.