New RAM causes GA-8l945G Pro to not Power Up

Computer Forum CPU, Motherboards and Memory
1

I installed two 1GB OCZ DDR2 (model OCZ2SOE6672GK) RAM sticks into the remaining two slots available. The other two slots contain two 500MB OCZ DDR2 (OCZ26671024ELDCGE-K) RAM sticks. As per the instructions in the manual, I made sure to install similar RAM sticks on channel 1 (slots 1 & 3) and channel 2 (slots 2 & 4). After doing so, when I press the power button, as soon as I let go, the computer turns off. If I press and hold the power button I get one beep but no signal is sent to the monitor and it remains in power save mode.

At one point it turned on but it failed at the IDE scan with the following message:
“Error! Firmware not ready.”

One other time it powered on correctly and got past this error message only to have it fail when trying to find a system disk.

Troubleshooting already attempted:
Check cabling (IDE, power)
All combinations of RAM:
-revert to old RAM
-remove old RAM only use new RAM
-use both but in different slots
Disconnect one or more IDE cabling
Rearrange IDE cabling to go to different slots

I’m at a loss as to what to try next. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

System:

Model Name : GA-8I945G Pro
--------------------------
M/B Rev : 1.0
BIOS Ver : 1.7?
Serial No. : 50537500668
Purchase Dealer : newegg
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
VGA Brand :       Model :
CPU Brand : Intel      Model : Intel Pentium 4 530J Prescott 3.0GHz LGA 775      Speed : 3.0GHz
Operation System : Win XP      SP : 2
Memory Brand : OCZ      Type : DDRII
Memory Size : 1GB 2x, 500MB 2x, 3GB Total      Speed : 677
Power Supply : 450 W


IDE1: 2 DVD R/W Combo Drives

IDE2: 2 120GB HDD

IDE3: 1 80GB HDD

Expansion Slots Used:
ATI D33053 PCI Graphics Card

Case:
RAIDMAX X1 TX-909WBP

Power Supply:
Set to 115V
2

The new OCZ ram was the only thing you added in there? Neither of those HDDs are new?

You also say thaqt you went back to the old ram. You’re still getting that error? That doesn’t really seem right if the new ram really is the only change you made. What happens if you clear your cmos? Have you simply done one stick of each ram in your 1 & 2 slots? Have you switched your dual channel setup so that the OCZ is in the opposite ddrs as they originally were?

3

The new OCZ ram was the only thing you added in there? Neither of those HDDs are new?

You also say thaqt you went back to the old ram. You’re still getting that error? That doesn’t really seem right if the new ram really is the only change you made. What happens if you clear your cmos? Have you simply done one stick of each ram in your 1 & 2 slots? Have you switched your dual channel setup so that the OCZ is in the opposite ddrs as they originally were?

I haven’t added or removed HDD. I pretty sure I tried different configurations of RAM in different slots (but it was late last night so I might try again).

I removed the new RAM, cleared the CMOS and restarted the computer. Now it powers up just fine but it fails on the IDE scan with the message "“Error! Firmware not ready.”

That seems to be independent of the RAM but I would appreciate help on that as well (maybe I’ll open a new thread on that). To stay true to the topic of this thread, I would like to be able to have both the old and new sticks of RAM work with the BIOS.

Since the symptom I’m seeing is power related I started to wonder if I needed to change the voltage for system memory. My options on the BIOS for “DIMM OverVoltage Control” are:

Normal (currently set)
+0.1
+0.2
+0.3
+0.4
+0.5
+0.6

From my motherboard’s specifications.:

Supports 1.8V DDR II DIMM

Supports dual channel DDR II 667/533/400 DIMM

So, it looks like if I change this setting to +0.2 to go from 1.8V to 2.0V then I should be w/in the range of both kits. Right?

Looking at the OCZ specifications for the new RAM it can work in a range of 1.9V - 2.2V (+0.1 - +0.3V for my BIOS settings):

2.2V EVP - OCZ’s unique Extended Voltage Protection feature allows PC2-5400 modules to handle voltages up to 2.2V ±5% and still be covered by our Lifetime Warranty.

Looking at the specs. for the old RAM shows it also can support the same range.

So, I go ahead and try 2.0V and 2.2V with both old and new RAM inside. I still get the original symptom (power turns off as soon as I let go of the power button).

I’m going to try just the new RAM at those voltage levels to see if I can get that to work.

4

Incase you fried your HDD, have you got a secondary that you could try to load up with? Pref IDE.

5

Well, voltage levels of 2.0V (+0.2V in BIOS) and 2.2V (+0.4V in BIOS) with the new ram does not work. It seems that right now the new RAM simply does not want to work.

As for the IDE problem, I have several other IDE drives I could try. I really wanted this to just be a RAM upgrade so I’m kind of hoping that once I fix the RAM issues (assuming they can be fixed) then the IDE problem will go away (perhaps my hope is in vain).

One of few times the computer did boot up successfully with all 4 RAM sticks in it, I put in a memtest cd and let it get through the first test before quitting.

Part of the reason this is so confusing is the I can’t see a single difference spec-wise between the two RAM kits (old and new) other than capacity (which shouldn’t make a difference). The only hint of incompatibility is between both kinds of RAM and the motherboard itself (see mobo specs). The mobo says it supports 1.8V and this RAM recommends 1.9V-2.2V. But the old RAM wouldn’t have worked before if the 0.1V was such a big deal. Plus, isn’t that what the BIOS option to tweak system memory voltage is for?

6

The reason I went with the hdd is because you said that is where the bios stops and says firmware not available, correct? As far as the memory settings in your BIOS, I would just keep it at auto until you get this issue resolved. If anything it would underclock your ram if they had any speed variance (which both look like they are 667.)

7

After some further troubleshooting I finally decided to remove all RAM and try each stick individually. It turns out that one of the new stick of RAM is bad. No matter what RAM configuration I try, if that one stick is in the system won’t start.

gazaway, oddly enough, when I start up without the bad stick of RAM installed the IDE scan error goes away.

The positive ending to this is that when I called up OCZ they said they would replace the kit for me even though I bought it through newegg.com. Bonus points to OCZ for customer service.

8

the speeds are the problem man.

one kit is 533mhz (or 500mhz as you wrote) the other kit is 667

system tries to work them all at 667 mhz so there’s a crash

remove all the sticks and install two 1gb ddr2-667 sticks, everything will be fine

9

I’d have to disagree. Their specs are identical except for their heat-sync coverings and capacity.

Old RAM: Specs

New RAM: Specs

10

on your given code it says speed is 667 but you say they are all 500 there’s something unidentified then :smiley: :smiley:

maybe cas latencies are different if you’re sure that they are the same speed i say again try one kit only at first if it boots, try the other kit also if this time it boots too, there is a crash between the specs

11

After some further troubleshooting I finally decided to remove all RAM and try each stick individually.

Sorry, I should have been a bit more descriptive here. What I did was remove all the ram then put in only one stick from the old kit and fired up the machine. Then I removed that stick and put it in the good pile. I then took the other stick and did the same. Then I did the same thing for each stick of the new kit individually. When I got to the last stick from the new kit the system didn’t start up.

What I then did was try that stick in each slot and then tried it with different combinations with other RAM. Any permutation of RAM that included this one stick from the new kit failed to start up.

Hope that clarifies.

12

if ther other kits are working together then that stick is the problem does that have a valid warranty on it?