If you have a 2011 MBP, do you use 16GB?

[thermodynamic]

My new 16GB Corsair RAM arrived today... and, with a memory test, it failed during the first run (I always do a burn-in of 5 runs before doing anything productive... data corruption is not cool...)

The previous time I attemped 16GB was also with Corsair, "Mac Certified" RAM, and it eventually failed the burn-in test during the third loop.

Replacing with the original Kingston RAM and re-testing showed the RAM working fully.

If you've attempted 16GB, and ran a battery of stress/burn-in tests and found all the RAM to pass, or even if not, would you chime in? I doubt my MBP is faulty, but anything's possible...

Thanks!

 

[alphaod]

The 16GB RAM on my Early 2011 MacBook Pro passes all tests. It's the Corsair non-Mac RAM.

 

[user418]

Late 2011 MBP, same 16GB Corsair RAM as previous poster. No problems after running AHT and 4-5 months usage.

 

[thermodynamic]

The 16GB RAM on my Early 2011 MacBook Pro passes all tests. It's the Corsair non-Mac RAM.

Late 2011 MBP, same 16GB Corsair RAM as previous poster. No problems after running AHT and 4-5 months usage.

Thanks, y'all!

I'll be eagerly awaiting the replacement kit. If it fails, what are the chances that three Corsair brand 16GB kits (2 Vengeance) are bad and not the system board of my MBP?

 

[Orlandoech]

You can also run 1600mhz ram on the 2011 15" and 17" mbp

Even though apple puts 1333mhz memory in them, sandy bridge For the quad core i7s support 32gb and 1600mhz.

 

[thermodynamic]

You can also run 1600mhz ram on the 2011 15" and 17" mbp

Even though apple puts 1333mhz memory in them, sandy bridge For the quad core i7s support 32gb and 1600mhz.

Oops - I forgot to mention I am installing the modules on an early-2011, 17" MBP.

I do have the 3-year AppleCare warranty, so if I do have to call in (I hope not!) it'll be fun to see how they explain things... but the 8GB tests all right and they'll probably say "It's not Apple-branded" or some other claim... actually, as Rember just froze up my MBP (mouse, screen, et al slowed and locked up but the caps lock remained usable, oddly), I should be testing with Snow Leopard - Rember is still at 0.37b and probably isn't happy with ML...

But I feel certain it's just the RAM that arrived is bad. (I hope!)

 

[phyrexia]

No problems here, 2x8GB Corsair sticks.

 

[thermodynamic]

No problems here, 2x8GB Corsair sticks.

Thanks as well!

With luck the replacement RAM coming will be fine. After x # of tries, I doubt it's all the RAM being bad but the system board. How to convince Apple, even when saying "725LL is listed as a compatible model but it does not work", not to say "that model does not support 16GB" will be the challenge... many people are saying it does work, is Corsair therefore lying when they say it works with 725LL when it does not, etc... assuming Apple challenges me... I've babied the thing and know how to properly work with computer equipment (two decades' experience)... it's rare a system board is bad and especially when the 8GB complement works fine, but anything's technically possible...

 

[Ledgem]

What sorts of errors are you seeing? I was always under the impression that if you see a few errors (say, up to four or so) that appear on only one run, it's fine; if you see errors on two runs, then as long as the sectors that the errors correspond to aren't the same, then it's fine. Obviously you're in a good place if there are zero errors

I had some bad RAM from Apple once. I would frequently encounter kernel panics when doing memory-intensive things. When I ran Memtest I would encounter 20+ errors, and they consistently appeared with each test loop, all from the same memory sectors.

 

[thermodynamic]

What sorts of errors are you seeing? I was always under the impression that if you see a few errors (say, up to four or so) that appear on only one run, it's fine; if you see errors on two runs, then as long as the sectors that the errors correspond to aren't the same, then it's fine. Obviously you're in a good place if there are zero errors

I had some bad RAM from Apple once. I would frequently encounter kernel panics when doing memory-intensive things. When I ran Memtest I would encounter 20+ errors, and they consistently appeared with each test loop, all from the same memory sectors.

Thanks for inquiring!

I'll have to get back to you on the error logs I saved, if the errors happened in the same spot or not. But here's the history so far:

The "Mac Certified" Corsair RAM I bought a couple months ago would fail after 3 loops (3 of 5)... so it failed the stress test. The system got unbearably hot as well, and the known-good 8GB Kingston RAM didn't heat up under the same stress tests. Oh, others reported problems with that RAM, despite being compatible with 725LL... so I felt confident it's rubbish RAM...

The Corsair Vengeance RAM I just bought stayed cool (yay!) but within 5 minutes Rember errored out and OS X would - a moment later - reveal a kernal panic. Rebooting and rerunning the test showed the same RAM location (or a nearly similar one and I can't get at the MBP until tonight) but no kernal panic... I should say that, between tests for the Vengeance RAM, I swapped the memory (slot A<>B)... I saved the log both times... The crashes happened around the same time... but that's not precise... If it's the same location showing up, despite reversing the chips between slots, then it might be the system board not liking the RAM... unless the reboot decided to logically map the RAM in reverse order for whatever reason (would not DIMM0 be registered first consistently?)...

I'll get back to you later today... thanks! (Any other input would be much welcomed, but so far the odds are still on the RAM... I hope!)

I did use Rember, and under Mountain Lion it might be freezing up. Tonight I am going to rerun Rember under the original 10.6.8 HDD and see if the freezing repeats... that might help, but the freezing I had seemed more to do with Rember misbehaving, it slowed over time and eventually the mouse would move slower and slower until it froze... the caps lock light would remain able to tunr on and off; most hardware test failures I'm aware of freeze it totally as well... being 0.37b and all...

https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=15561596#post15561596

 

[iLikeTurtles!]

have, yes

does my macbook utitlize all 16gb?

not even close

 

[clyde2801]

have, yes

does my macbook utitlize all 16gb?

not even close

will i go back to 8 or 4 gigs?

hell, no!

 

[Interstella5555]

Bad RAM happens, get a replacement if you can't get it to work.

 

[thermodynamic]

Bad RAM happens, get a replacement if you can't get it to work.

Am doing so.

It's just the frequency of bad RAM - maybe I've just had bad luck... that's what I'm hoping for, but after a point, whatever else - regardless of how improbable - must be considered...

 

[thermodynamic]

What sorts of errors are you seeing? I was always under the impression that if you see a few errors (say, up to four or so) that appear on only one run, it's fine; if you see errors on two runs, then as long as the sectors that the errors correspond to aren't the same, then it's fine. Obviously you're in a good place if there are zero errors

The two error logs show errors in two separate memory blocks.

First run:

FAILURE! Data mismatch at local BUFA address 0x000000016ba22040, BUFB address 0x0000000326546840
BUFA Data: 0x3044333705ccaed0, BUFB Data: 0x304433372accaed0

Second run, after reversing the two modules order in the sockets:

Running tests on full 14036MB region...
Stuck Address : setting 1 of 16

FAILURE! Data mismatch at local address 0x00000004605c3040
Actual Data: 0xfffffffb00a3cfbf

It's probably bad RAM but if the next lot that comes in acts up, I might have to find another machine somewhere/somehow to test the RAM on, to prove the RAM is okay and the MBP is faulty... if it is, I hope it (the MBP) is not...

 

[Ledgem]

The Corsair Vengeance RAM I just bought stayed cool (yay!) but within 5 minutes Rember errored out and OS X would - a moment later - reveal a kernal panic. Rebooting and rerunning the test showed the same RAM location (or a nearly similar one and I can't get at the MBP until tonight) but no kernal panic... I should say that, between tests for the Vengeance RAM, I swapped the memory (slot A<>B)... I saved the log both times... The crashes happened around the same time... but that's not precise... If it's the same location showing up, despite reversing the chips between slots, then it might be the system board not liking the RAM... unless the reboot decided to logically map the RAM in reverse order for whatever reason (would not DIMM0 be registered first consistently?)...

I didn't realize you had a kernel panic. On that alone I share your concern that the RAM is faulty. There's only one other thing I'm curious about (although I'm sure you're doing it): when you install the RAM, are you ensuring that it's seated firmly?

 

[thermodynamic]

I didn't realize you had a kernel panic. On that alone I share your concern that the RAM is faulty. There's only one other thing I'm curious about (although I'm sure you're doing it): when you install the RAM, are you ensuring that it's seated firmly?

Only one panic, just after I closed Rember... Sorry for the confusion, and thanks for getting back to me again as well!

I might try re-inserting the RAM again, but it did feel firm in its socket on both previous occasions. Both modules were under the little clips that prevent the RAM from going up...

The new RAM will arrive early next week. Am keeping my fingers crossed...

 

[thermodynamic]

*sigh*

This new set took ~25 minutes to fail, but the system froze up at about the 70% mark through.



No kernal panic and no crash by Rember... system reported 67C (well within limits), all 4 cores active at the time of the freeze... it's possible ML is causing the freeze but I doubt it.

I'm putting back SL and trying again. I hope it's ML with this old version of Rember that's causing the problem... (oh, the ML HDD was a Seagate Momentus XT 750 (w/8GB SSD cache). The original HDD was Apple's 750B HDD.)

 

[yusukeaoki]

Bought it last year, non-Mac RAM by corsair.
I have the 1600MHz 16GB Vengeance.

Runs great on my machine and cant wait for 32GB!

 

[thermodynamic]

I'm putting back SL and trying again. I hope it's ML with this old version of Rember that's causing the problem... (oh, the ML HDD was a Seagate Momentus XT 750 (w/8GB SSD cache). The original HDD was Apple's 750B HDD.)

Possible good news:

~30 minutes into the test with the original, non-Seagate HDD. The RAM test has a long way to go, interestingly enough, as it is at ~20%. After putting back the original HDD, something else must have made more RAM available to Rember or something...

I might be premature, but what if it was the Seagate drive causing the snafu:

http://forums.seagate.com/t5/Moment...solution-s-for-beach-ball-problems/m-p/165494

Am keeping my fingers crossed that it was the HDD all along.

 

[thekev]

*sigh*

This new set took ~25 minutes to fail, but the system froze up at about the 70% mark through.



No kernal panic and no crash by Rember... system reported 67C (well within limits), all 4 cores active at the time of the freeze... it's possible ML is causing the freeze but I doubt it.

I'm putting back SL and trying again. I hope it's ML with this old version of Rember that's causing the problem... (oh, the ML HDD was a Seagate Momentus XT 750 (w/8GB SSD cache). The original HDD was Apple's 750B HDD.)

You may want to try a different brand of ram. Corsair gets a lot of complaints on the online retailer sites. It doesn't mean they all fail, but the number of reviewers who have experienced bad memory are consistently higher. It's popular because it's cheap. Beyond that avoid the ram with stupid heat sinks attached. Rember doesn't seem like a great utility as it runs on top of OSX. This is a really limited way to test ram. As for HDDs, Apple mostly uses Seagate and Western Digital. I am not sure whether the firmware revision is specific.

Possible good news:

~30 minutes into the test with the original, non-Seagate HDD. The RAM test has a long way to go, interestingly enough, as it is at ~20%. After putting back the original HDD, something else must have made more RAM available to Rember or something...

I might be premature, but what if it was the Seagate drive causing the snafu:

http://forums.seagate.com/t5/Moment...solution-s-for-beach-ball-problems/m-p/165494

Am keeping my fingers crossed that it was the HDD all along.

Ideally you would run memory tests in single user mode. That allows it to test much more than it can through a GUI.

 

[thermodynamic]

Bought it last year, non-Mac RAM by corsair.
I have the 1600MHz 16GB Vengeance.

Runs great on my machine and cant wait for 32GB!

Thanks for the input! (32GB would be sweet, too!)

It's great to read these positive responses; it's probable my first batch of RAM 3 months ago was bad (with that, temps got into the 70s and 80s and stayed there, with the Vengeance - problems or not - it's stayed in the 40s and 50s, going up to 67 at only one point...) With the advent of reading Mac problems with the Seagate Momentus hybrid drives, there is hope the core problem is not the system board but that drive...

Or maybe not.

The test is now stuck. Status bar stopped animating, but mouse still moves, albeit with jitters - not unlike what happened before... Finder is not responding, either. I cannot launch anything, or use any keystroke to terminate any app.

I'll have to put back the original (4GB) RAM and test. If it fails, then it might be a bad system board after all...

----------

You may want to try a different brand of ram. Corsair gets a lot of complaints on the online retailer sites. It doesn't mean they all fail, but the number of reviewers who have experienced bad memory are consistently higher. It's popular because it's cheap. Beyond that avoid the ram with stupid heat sinks attached. Rember doesn't seem like a great utility as it runs on top of OSX. This is a really limited way to test ram. As for HDDs, Apple mostly uses Seagate and Western Digital. I am not sure whether the firmware revision is specific.



Ideally you would run memory tests in single user mode. That allows it to test much more than it can through a GUI.

Thanks for the info! I'll keep the RAM installed for now, just in case it's a combination of factors -- Rember worked for me 3 months ago, but you're right - there are plenty of mitigating factors that could create false positives...

I'll scout for third party test utilities - is there one you'd recommend or prefer?

I wish there was a way to ramp up the fan speeds while testing RAM, especially this much... that, apart from Memtest+ crashing when boting from it, is why I chose Rember. The Apple built-in self-test would pass on its own, but I prefer multiple loops...

If Corsair is putting out cheap RAM, it's a shame... that's not a good way to build a reputation... well, a good reputation that is... they used to be a good name, as was Mushkin but they have a not dissimilar 16GB kit for sale as well... and at a slightly lower price...

 

[ixodes]

I installed Crucial in mine. All is well.

 

[thekev]

Thanks for the info! I'll keep the RAM installed for now, just in case it's a combination of factors -- Rember worked for me 3 months ago, but you're right - there are plenty of mitigating factors that could create false positives...

I'll scout for third party test utilities - is there one you'd recommend or prefer?

I wish there was a way to ramp up the fan speeds while testing RAM, especially this much... that, apart from Memtest+ crashing when boting from it, is why I chose Rember. The Apple built-in self-test would pass on its own, but I prefer multiple loops...

If Corsair is putting out cheap RAM, it's a shame... that's not a good way to build a reputation... well, a good reputation that is... they used to be a good name, as was Mushkin but they have a not dissimilar 16GB kit for sale as well... and at a slightly lower price...

It all comes from the same factories. Corsair doesn't really make their own chips. They're just rebranded, which is fine. My issue is that I'm not sure of their overall quality control. Obviously a lot of it works fine, or they'd go out of business due to the quantity of returns. Note that Corsair is one of the cheapest at the moment. That's why people choose it so frequently. I swear there's a current working memtest on the newest models. I'll have to look it up. Regarding Mushkin, they are a manufacturer. The last thing I wish to mention is that if something is crashing while within normal working temperatures (or even high temperatures that are within spec) you may have a hardware problem. You can always use something like Prime95's torture test to test system stability.

 

[thermodynamic]

It all comes from the same factories. Corsair doesn't really make their own chips. They're just rebranded, which is fine. My issue is that I'm not sure of their overall quality control. Obviously a lot of it works fine, or they'd go out of business due to the quantity of returns. Note that Corsair is one of the cheapest at the moment. That's why people choose it so frequently. I swear there's a current working memtest on the newest models. I'll have to look it up. Regarding Mushkin, they are a manufacturer. The last thing I wish to mention is that if something is crashing while within normal working temperatures (or even high temperatures that are within spec) you may have a hardware problem. You can always use something like Prime95's torture test to test system stability.

Thanks for the info!

I might set up a Bootcamp partition...

I did read up on Memtest for Mac and how to boot into single user mode. I'm running Apple Hardware Test on the RAM right now (booted while holding down "D"), but might reboot now and run Memtest instead... the system does have the SL HDD installed... I recall AHT running fine with the original 16GB I bought as well, but I never booted in single user mode to run any testing therein...