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I had a few Dell Optiplex GX270 PCs on my work with 256 mb memory on board, so they were quite slow with Windows XP. After I replaced the memory with 2 x 512 mb modules in dual channel mode, they become much faster, however one box started to hung, turning the monitor into the sleep mode. It works fine with one module installed and I've tried different combinations of modules, so it's probably not connected to modules itself. I guess it has something to do with the dual channel not working properly. If there's anything I can do to troubleshoot this issue? Thanks!

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  • After the screen goes blank there're some noise coming from the CD drive...
    – Serg
    Jun 12, 2009 at 14:52
  • Thank you! I've ordered a new motherboard on eBay. New caps.
    – Serg
    Jul 22, 2009 at 18:57

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Could be a bad motherboard. Were you taking precautions against static electricity, such as wearing a ground strap, or keeping on hand on the computer's chasis?

You could try a memory test from EBCD. If it fails with completely different RAM modules, then I would think it's a bad motherboard. If the memory test passes, then I'd run chkdsk and make sure the paging file is set to a large fixed size, say 2 GB.

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  • Yeah, but I hold my hand on the radiator instead. I'm running Memtest86 right now and there're no errors so far. It seems that the computer works fine in DOS environment :) I wonder what the paging file has to do with my case. I had reinstalled Windows XP earlier today with the single 512 mb module to exclude stuff like that, however this hanging continue to appear.
    – Serg
    Jun 12, 2009 at 13:32
  • If computer is still hanging after a fresh reinstall then you want to look for common factors - hardware (except for the RAM), possibly software, and drivers. It sounds to me like the RAM upgrade may be a red herring. Do the system logs reveal anything useful, or is there a dump file? Check System Properties...Advanced...Startup and Recovery to make sure the computer writes a dump file (input for Windbg), and that it doesn't restart on failure (maybe error message is displayed).
    – Eric H
    Jun 12, 2009 at 16:37
  • Still no luck. Works with single 512 module, hangs'n'blanks with 2 x 512 modules.
    – Serg
    Jun 17, 2009 at 22:15
  • What happens if you put the 2 modules in the other pair of slots on the motherboard (I'm not really sure this will work)? Ideally you'd have them in the first pair, but maybe there's something wrong with the motherboard's first pair of slots.
    – Eric H
    Jun 18, 2009 at 2:24
  • Thanks, I've tried that but with no result. I decided to change the capacitors.
    – Serg
    Jul 2, 2009 at 14:09

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