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XPS 420 Memory problem
I have a Dell XPS 420 and I do have a problem that I am unable to sort.
The XPS worked very well and in the recent past no new hardware nor software was installed. The system is regularly cleaned (no dust to keep the fans as silent as possible) and I recently did a registry clean-up.
Yesterday while the machine was idle and nothing more than Outlook open, the screens went black and the system started to beep.
After a trial to reboot the beeping continued and the little screen on top said: “Memory modules detected but a memory failure has occurred”.
I found on the web that you had to take out the memory modules and place them one by one in the first slot to check. I took out all 4 1 GB modules and did this check and they all work well. so I tried some combinations:
If I place any of the modules in slot 1 or 3 or two modules 1 and 3 the machine will work.
If I place modules in 1 & 2 or 3 & 4 or just 2 or just 4 it will beep and will not start.
I do not quit understand why, but it seems that memory slot 2 and slot 4 are the ones that cause the trouble.
So my questions are:
Is this the beginning of the end and might the other slots stop working soon too?
Or is there a system / bios or whatever setting that might have gone wrong?
Can I install two 2 Gb modules in 1 and 3 to have 4 Gb again?
fireberd
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June 11th, 2011 04:00
Actually physical slots 1 and 3 are the first "pair" and physical slots 2 and 4 are the second "pair" of memory. Try resetting the BIOS (CMOS Memory) and then try the memory to see if it clears it. Removing the CR2032 CMOS backup battery (with the PC powered off) for about 5 minutes will reset the CMOS memory.
Althought this has nothing to do with the memory problem, Registry "cleaners" are mostly "snake oil" and don't really make a difference. In fact, you have to be careful as we see a lot of problems on here caused by these types of programs.
Gijs52
3 Posts
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June 11th, 2011 07:00
Hi fireberd, Thanks for the fast reaction.
I have tried your suggestion right away. Unfortunately the result remains the same, whenever I put something in 2 & 4 the PC will not boot, still beeps and shows the same message.
It's unfortunate since reducing the memory to half its size has a big impact on the speed of the machine, especially noticeable while editing some movie material.
I could get two 2Gb memory strips, but I’m afraid that the rest of the memory banks stop working too. I’m now running a backup to make sure that I will not lose my data ( :
dwebber
36 Posts
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October 2nd, 2011 17:00
Are you still having this problem? I have a xps 630i that is doing the same thing,only my 2 sticks of mem. were put in like this from dell (which is wrong) the first 2 sticks should be in slots 1 and 2 white by runing them in 1 and 3 you are runing in single channelinstead of dual.when i try to put them in the right slots I get the same results as yours . Dell had some very bad years during the XPS era.
Gijs52
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October 3rd, 2011 02:00
Yes it's not solved. We have removed the main board completely, cleaned it carefully and checked it on visible damage. It all looks good but still is defective. A technician told me the only option is to change the board which is too expensive. So I have placed 2, 2gb memory modules in slot 1 and 3 (so the bottom white and black ones) and avoid using the top two, I get the memory error. That is a far from optimal configuration but it keeps the PC working.
After the memory issues I had a disk crash (disks in raid0) and wanted to have a raid 5 set up to avoid losing data again (which according to the original Intel main oard specs of the xps420 should work, but what dell has disabled).
So I have purchased a secondhand empty xps720, changed the processor to a QX6850 and transferred a number of parts. It's a huge machine, a bit noisy but it's fast, raid 5 with 5, 2Tb disks is working and so do both the sets of memory slots.
dwebber
36 Posts
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October 3rd, 2011 07:00
P.S. to above post I did have to hard start my computer once or twice after adding the second stick since it went into the high fan speed mode but then it worked
dwebber
36 Posts
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October 3rd, 2011 07:00
Try this it worked for me.
Put 1 stick in slot 1
Restart into safe mode
Shut computer down
Add next stick into slot 2
Restart
This worked for me to get out of single channel onto duel channel using my org. memory.I think that it has something to do with the GPU not starting up during safe mode .Also I found out that CL6 memory does not like the 650i MB's which is what I bough for the upgrade and will be changing for a CL5 with 5-5-5-18 and hope it works.
well i hope this helps you also