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Posted (edited)

This is only barely worth a thread, but since there is a risk of people spending money for no reason for something like this I thought I'd share what happened as I was typing my response to the patch 1.0.1 thread:

 

Bluescreen.

 

I start off with a ...01. I start doing some factfinding and testing and eventually "reduce" it to a ...050 with page fault. Finally! Narrowed it conclusively to memory. "Ah well", I think, "I've run those 800MHz sticks at 1100 for quite a while, it's fair enough if they burn out."

 

(This is after some analysis of the MCP, since heat profiles first led me to suspect it.)

 

So I decide I want a functioning system even if it is castrated for RAM, and remove one of the sticks. Everything works. Ahah, I think, but just to get it confirmed I remove that last stick and insert the suspected faulty one. And the system works. All checks pass. Now I'm starting to wonder. I then get both sticks installed again, and test it all out. It works. Nothing wrong.

 

Then it hits me: When I removed the first stick, just out of habit I blew some air through it. I suspect that that removed whatever dust was shorting components. (Obviously it's hard to replicate now to be definitive.)

 

So if you are using a HAF 932 from Cooler Master and get weird errors that don't troubleshoot "properly", remember to attempt the simple solution of getting some air blowing through the suspect components. Cases like the HAF 932 are really poor at keeping dust out, and I have been keeping a regime of cleaning the components with compressed air once a month to counter that - but obviously I had forgotten the memory sticks. Something as simple as that is apparently quite capable of causing errors like "page faults in unpaged adress space"...

Edited by EtherealN

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Posted

There could be another reason. The copper on the RAM contacts oxidizes through time, its possible that by removing and adding the sticks again you scraped the oxidation into bare metal establishing proper connection again.

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Posted

Hm. That's actually a good point.

 

But they've only been there since january. Does this still apply as a possibility?

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Daniel "EtherealN" Agorander | Даниэль "эфирныйн" Агорандер

Intel i7 2600K @ 4.4GHz, ASUS Sabertooth P67, 8GB Corsair Vengeance @ 1600MHz, ASUS GTX 560Ti DirectCU II 1GB, Samsung 830series 512GB SSD, Corsair AX850w, two BENQ screens and TM HOTAS Warthog

DCS: A-10C Warthog FAQ | DCS: P-51D FAQ | Remember to read the Forum Rules |

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| Life of a Game Tester
Posted

Found this on another forum. The poster describes much better then I can what could possibly be another potential reason for your issue, chip creep. Maybe even the most likely

 

"Chip Creep"

Chip creep is the process of PC components creeping out of there expansion slot over time. This occurrence is directly caused by the heating and cooling of the ambient temp inside the PC case. As the temperature rises your components, and slots will expand, as the PC cools these same part shrink back down. The constant or frequent expanding and contracting inside your PC causes the "chips" to "creep" and become loose from there assigned slot.

 

Chip creep can effect all different components and part inside the PC, from hard drives, to PCI slot, and RAM. Even Molex connectors and drive cables can be effected by chip creep and loose solid connection to the hardware. So keep in mind before you throw it out the window or bash it with a hammer... just rebuild it first you may be surprised at what it can fix.

Posted (edited)

That Chip Creep theory is bit of fiction/fantasy... the expansion/contraction of the slots are negligible and even if it was enough to loosen the contact there would have to be some force trying to oull the card outwards and as far as I know the only force that does have some effect on them is gravity,a nd it's pulling the card downwards, not sideways (to pull the cards out), not to mention all PCI cards are held in slots by screws, even the RAM modules are not just pliugged in, they have clips to secure them also. There is no way for cards or connectors to unplug themselves like that.

 

Oxidisation of the contacts can happen if they were bit dirty.

Edited by Kuky
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Posted

I agree with Kuky, I am not saying it cant happen, but for every million pc's out there I would guess that its maybe happened to 1 or 2 if that and probably because of human error to start with, also ram wont come out of its slot in a hurry since its clipped in at the edges, also pci cards wont come out because they are screwed in and same with the cpu, it has a huge cooler snapped inplace making sure nothing comes out.

 

It may happen with harddrives that slide in rather than being screwed in, but somehow I cant see it happening to any pc thats built properly in the first place.

Posted (edited)

Chip creep can indeed happen albeit not very often. I just recently serviced a 3 year old box on site in which the video card (agp) which was clipped and screwed down had lost good contact in the slot. This was not gravity as the box was secured and could not have been slammed. Removed and re-seated it and all good. I have also seen this from time to time with memory modules. Regardless of screws/clips some cards modules can and will move from heat enough to prevent good contact within the slot. They do not pop out of the slots. That is just silly. They can sometimes move enough to need to be re-seated after a long time (usually many months) of heat cycling. It mostly occurs in older machines but can also occur infrequently with newer hardware as well.

 

I have worked on many machines over the years and it is by no means something I see regularly but it is certainly not fiction or fantasy. It's also taught as a possible issue to check when troubleshooting and mentioned in several courses that prepare you for testing for CompTia A+ Hardware/Software certification and they do not usually present myth as a viable option to check while servicing machines.

 

Out

Edited by PoleCat
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