Am I upgrading RAM correctly

[vae victus]

I just bought 8 gigs (2 sticks) of Patriot PC3-12800 1600MHz CL11 1.35 volts RAM to upgrade my Toshiba Qosmio x505 q870 4 gigs (2 sticks) Samsung PC3 - 8500S 1066 MHz 1.5 volts RAM from a brick and mortar Fryes.

I merrily watched a YouTube vid of how to swap out the RAM and made sure all the connections were nice and snug. I turned it on, used Speccy to see if it detected the RAM properly and started up a game of Mechwarrior Online which my poor laptop was having a horrendous time running lately. The first game it ran like a charm, i saw a drastic FPS increase and I had a merry time playing. 2nd game.... game froze. I thought, oh well, no biggie, damn game is buggy, just another mem leak. I cold shutdown and started up and logged on TeamSpeak to tell my buddies my bad about crashing. I told them how i just upgraded my RAM and they told me that i might be having issues in having voltages of different strength (which they are from 1.5 to 1.35) and that maybe i dont have enough PSU juice, incompatible mobo, and if i kept running it i might perma damage my laptop. So immediately i shutdown and jumped on another computer to post and get to the bottom of things.

So i did some more research, i originally used http/www.crucial.com/store/listparts.aspx?model=Qosmio%20X505-Q870 to help find compatible RAM to buy and upgrade with and the RAM i got seem to be the same. The only difference is that my RAM is much better at 1600 instead of 1333 and 1066 respectively. The voltages of both 1.35 and 1.5 seem to be okay, so i wonder if my friends were wrong, or if i put it in bad, or i got a bad batch of RAM.

 

[vae victus]

bump

 

[rgd1101]

get into bios and see if the setting is 1.35.

 

[vae victus]

Currently it's at bio v2.30

So 1.35 is an upgrade?

 

[vae victus]

Also in BIOS its got the right counter at 8 gigs as well

 

[jarotech]

get into bios and see if the setting is 1.35.

He means to look in the BIOS to see if the voltage is at 1.35v.

 

[blazorthon]

rgd1101 was referring to the memory voltage by saying 1.35, not the BIOS version. IDK if your laptop's BIOS will even state this information. If not, you should find it easily by downloading the CPU-Z program. It gives a lot of system information about the CPU and RAM as well as a little info about the graphics.

 

[blazorthon]

Here is a download link:
http/www.softpedia.com/dyn-postdownload.php?p=6980&t=4&i=1

The memory voltage info in found in the SPD tab.

EDIT: also, CPU-Z reports memory frequency as half of what the memory is said to be running by Windows and the seller of the memory because it reports the real frequency instead of the data rate. For example, DDR3-1600 memory is reported as about 800MHz, DDR3-1333 memory is reported as about 667MHz, etc. Don't be alarmed if it reports your memory as half of what it's supposed to be 😉

 

[vae victus]

IC, that makes sense, maybe the mobo is supplying more voltage and is overloading the RAM causing the freeze.

So through using CPU Z i can change the voltage?

 

[vae victus]

Under the SPD tab it shows i have 4 JEDECs (which i'm assuming add em all up is my 2 stick of ram). Voltage as shown is 1.28V per JEDEC. Everything looks right from my layman's eyes.

 

[blazorthon]

Under the SPD tab it shows i have 4 JEDECs (which i'm assuming add em all up is my 2 stick of ram). Voltage as shown is 1.28V per JEDEC. Everything looks right from my layman's eyes.

JEDECs are different specs that the memory can run in. Are they all saying 1.28V? That kinda far from the 1.35V that the modules are rated at. That may be causing your instability if that's what they're running at.

EDIT: Also, check the memory tab. That'll tell you which spec they are using right now.

 

[vae victus]

Hmm... well it says

DDR3 Dual Channel
8192 Megs
NB Freq 1980~

DRAM Freq 650~
FSB😀RAM 2:10
CL 9 clocks
tRCD 9
tRP 9
Cycle Time tRAS 24
Row Refresh tRFC 107
Command Rate 1T

 

[vae victus]

Friend suggested i use memtest86 to see if i got some bad ram. Also my laptops temp seems to be running higher than usual. So i guess my laptop is now overheating like mad. Ill likely put in my old ram to see if the problem persists, so i can narrow down the culprit.

 

[vae victus]

MemTest shows no errors after 10 passes. I think thats enough.

Gonna update the BIOs to v2.9 and see if i can change the RAM voltage settings to the proper 1.35V

I've been doing some checking around, not too sure how to do that. I've monkeyed around with the BIOs before and never saw a voltage change section.

 

[weaselman]

Oh dear you in trouble here if you cannot get to 1.35v for the memory.
(1600MHz) Data Rate. • 1.35V Power Requirement ..
I just looked at the manual, and belive it or not it states 1066Mhz, or 1333Mhz memory is installed.
It makes no mention of 1600Mhz memory even being supported.
Sorry buddy. If the case the cpu FSB speed, and the memory are out of sync, crash crash,crash, to put it mildly.

Time to Rma the memory and exchange. The more work memory does the more power it needs to keep it stable. Obviously it would pass a mem test fine at ten passes. It`s not in windows is it or running a game demanding more voltage do drive the memory ram chips is it. The only cure would be to lower the rate of the memory manually in the bios down to 667Mhz =1333Mhz total 667Mhz up, 667Mhz down =1333Mhz total. Even then if the voltage was too low or not supported by the latop it`s time to Rma the new ram modules. That way because it is not running the memory at 800Mhz each way may solve the problem. I mean what voltage does it state on the 1333Mhz 4gb stick you had in. says it all if its 1.28v

 

[vae victus]

Im gonna pop in my old ram and use cpu-z to check again, but specs listed should be 1.5v. So basically its not getting the juice it needs to run properly falling short at 1.28v when it needs 1.35v. So odd when the previous RAM needed 1.5v to power it up, makes no sense to be falling short when the old RAM needed more juice to run 😉

Well thankfully Fryes is only about 10 mins away from work so returning it isnt a big deal. I also just posted this topic on the Toshiba support forum and I bet theyre gonna come back at me with the same reason, that this mobo just doesnt support 1600 ram's power req.

Course i'll really be peeved if i get some 1333 and the same issue crops up. I wonder if i should just buy 4 more gigs of cheap 1066 ram to stack on or outright replace with 2 4 gigs of 1333.

 

[vae victus]

Also a big thank you to everyone who came to help (or lurked hoping to help)!