Display glitches, random restarts and... bad RAM?

[flextone79]

Hi,

Having a few problems with my MBP, hope you guys can help. It's an old one, mid 2009 13" unibody that I gave my wife after switching to a 5,1 Mac Pro. A few months ago I upgraded the RAM from 4 to 8GB (2x4), and updated the OS from snow leopard to mavericks. She has been using it ever since with no problems.

Recently, she started noticing the display flickering, screen glitches with bursts of color and strange patterns, as well as random restarts. The logs say Kernel Panic, and the process is any process that was currently running. The machine is not hot at all, and the fan wasn't audible.

Now. I ran the Apple Hardware Test from the install DVD and it found a RAM error - 4MEM/4/40000000: 0xaa325098. I already tried reseating the two RAM sticks but the AHT catches that error again.

What should be my next move? Removing one stick etc? Could it nevertheless be the gfx chipset or lcs and not the RAM at all?


Thanks,
R

 

[vkd]

RAM is the easiest and most non-destructive item to test so yes, you should take out all the RAM sticks and test them independently. Best would be to take them to a professional RAM dealer who has a testing device for individual RAM sticks.

 

[Fishrrman]

RAM could be bad, or...
... a RAM -SLOT- could be going bad.
Or it could even be something else -- something else finally giving out elsewhere.

What I'd try:
- Take the newer RAM out and put the old (factory) RAM back in. Any change?
- Try running with ONLY ONE DIMM slot occupied. No problems? Then try the other slot with the SAME DIMM. Still ok? Repeat the process with the OTHER DIMM.

Yes, this is a lot of work.
But you may have to do this to "run the problem down".

 

[flextone79]

Alright thanks. I was just wondering if I there's anything I should try before going through this elimination process. When I change RAM slots and sticks, it would be easier for me to run the hardware test instead of waiting for the issue to occur after each step, but then I won't be 100% sure it's indeed gone. Oh well, I guess that's part of the work.

Thanks again,
R

 

[flextone79]

So, I swapped out the sticks, checked each of them in both slots etc. The conclusion is that I only get that 4MEM error when both sticks are used together. Separately they both seem to be fine.

But what does that mean? BTW these are identical Samsung RAM sticks from the same package.

 

[Fishrrman]

"But what does that mean?"

To me, it "means" -- Get some DIFFERENT RAM -- that works.