BSOD From RAM?

[ace123]

A while back I decided to start using my desktop again. While playing World of Warcraft I blue screened and thought nothing of it. I continued to blue screen whenever I used any program that accessed a lot of RAM. I took out my RAM sticks and tried them one by one, and I seemed to have found the bad one. I took that one out and started using my computer normally. One day I tried using the second RAM stick again and everything worked fine. However lately the RAM stick proved defective again. I don't know if it is the RAM stick that is broken or if it is my second RAM port on my motherboard.

The attached is a report from a crash without a blue screen that I got when I only used the RAM stick I believe is broken. If I try running both again, I'll post another report with a blue screen.

I am running 2GB with both sticks in as each one is 1GB.

 

[Devux]

It is really common to have Blue Screens caused by RAM, there could be a variety of issues concerning the RAM. It could be just a bad stick of RAM, this has happened to me a handful of times. It could be RAM that is incompatible with your system. Or it could be how the RAM is installed, your computer may need slots to be filled in a certain order (they are usually colour coded when this is the case) or the RAM may need to be installed in matching pairs, matching both the capacity and the speed of the RAM.

 

[ace123]

My motherboard only has two slots so putting them in a wrong spot/order makes no difference. The RAM has worked for the past 2 years consistently and I haven't had to deal with any problems so far. I think as you said, it's just a bad stick. All of a sudden it went from perfect, to trash. I assume it just gave out since it seems to be only one stick that causes the errors. If I boot with just that stick, the computer will die within 5 minutes.

 

[Devux]

Well it certainly sounds like the RAM. If you want to be absolutely sure you can make a memtest boot disk, boot to it and see what it has to say about your RAM. It's a free utility that lots of folks around here swear by.
Memtest86.com - Memory Diagnostic