Mavericks crashes on 16 GB RAM

I am having the exact same issue as you, as I had one 8GB stick, it was perfect until Mavericks, then it just started crashing and restarting on its own. I don't know what the issue was, but I switched back to the 2x2GB that came with my MacBook Pro, and I've had 0 issues but at the price of it being much slower (-4GB of RAM). It's very frustrating. Hopefully someone will find a fix or they will come out with an update! I'm crossing my fingers.

At least I'm not the only one having this issue..

BTW I'm on a 2012 MacBook Pro 13"

Have either of you tested the RAM?

Apple hardware test should be built in on newer models (hold D at boot).

https://support.apple.com/kb/HT1509.

Run an 'extended test' & it should do a full check of the installed RAM.

See if reports any issues.

Also see rember…

http://www.kelleycomputing.net/rember/

It does a similar test, but some claim it is better than AHT.

Pay close attention to any 'RAM paring', some machines will not like unmatched pairs of RAM in the incorrect slots. There is usually a "User installable parts" guide in the Apple manuals that explains how it should be installed. Search for you model name. The correct support pages are usually linked from System Profiler too.

I wonder how clean your OS's are? If there are third party extensions they may cause crashes, but it doesn't really fit with it only happening on the 16GB of RAM.

I would look at an EtreCheck report to see if it has any signs of kernel extensions or Startup Items. Both could conflict with the OS in weird ways.

http://www.etresoft.com/etrecheck

daniyalme and wibanks95, you both most likely have bad RAM.

You could try a utility such as MemTest <http://osxdaily.com/2011/05/03/memtest-mac-ram-test/> to check you RAM. There is also this RAM testing guide <http://guides.macrumors.com/Testing_RAM>. And Apple's Hardware tests <http://support.apple.com/kb/PH11342>

Contact your RAM vendor and request replacement or a refund.

System crashes with RAM upgrades is very common when some RAM suppliers use marginal components. And sometimes it just happens to the best RAM vendors.

Most RAM vendors have replacement policies. I have had to replace 3rd party RAM in the past. I've called the vendor and they have replaced the RAM with good units.

I have not had any issues since I started using Crucial.com. Both Crucial.com and MacSales.com (OWC) have very good reputations with Mac users.

Hi, daniyalme I actually ended up calling apple because it was such an issue. I had tested my RAM and it showed nothing was wrong with it, so it IS good RAM. They told me to shut down my macbook, and do the following,

1. Turn off your Mac. Don’t worry about disconnecting the power or removing the battery
2. Turn on your Mac and hold down the Command, Option, P, and R keys all at the same time (all four keys).
3. Keep holding down all four keys until you hear the startup sound for a second time.

If it’s on, turn it off. Connect the power adapter to a working power source and your Mac. On the built-in keyboard, press the (left side) Shift-Control-Option keys along with the power button at the same time. (You must use the keys on the left side of the keyboard.) Wait 5 seconds and press the power button to start the Mac.

And after that go into disk utility, and click Macintosh HD, click verify disk, and then verify disk permissions and repair disk permissions. It will take a while but I did all of this and have found it to work perfectly, I haven't experienced any issues since.

If you need help with the above feel free to reply. Thanks.

Hi there, I'm actually having a similar issue. I also have a mid-2010 Macbook Pro 7,1 with 4GB of RAM running OSX Mavericks.

I bought two sticks of 8GB DDR3 PC3-8500 SODIMM 1066MHz RAM.

When I install them both, the laptop doesn't boot. (stays at the grey screen).

I tried installing each individually with a 2GB stick, and the computer boots and runs for a couple hours but ultimately fails.

Do you think this is a Mavericks firmware upgrade problem? Has anyone tried upgrading RAM after they updated to 10.9?

I'm doing this AFTER I upgraded to Mavricks, so nothing is working at all, although the ram should technically work with this model.

Any thoughts?

Do you think this is a Mavericks firmware upgrade problem? Has anyone tried upgrading RAM after they updated to 10.9?

You most likely have bad RAM. Contact your RAM vendor for replacement.

NOTE: I have seen what looked like perfectly good RAM fail after an operating system upgrade because the new OS stressed the RAM in a way the old one did not, and exposed failing RAM.

The RAM isn't bad and I'm trying to newly install it after the 10.9 upgrade. It seems like others are having the same problem.

allisonb213 wrote:

The RAM isn't bad and I'm trying to newly install it after the 10.9 upgrade. It seems like others are having the same problem.

How do you know that the RAM isn't bad for a fact?

Have you seen any machine work with these modules?

Have you run Apple Hardware Test on these modules?

Have you run Memtest or Rember on the modules?

See: Using Apple Hardware Test - https://support.apple.com/kb/HT1509

There are many tools to test RAM, forgive me if you have tested these modules, you don't indicate that you have done so.

If your theory is correct you can simply install something below 10.9 & boot into it (maybe on an external USB), it may work, or the RAM could be bad. Without testing you are just jumping to conclusions.

P.S. Contact the vendor, they may just ship you new modules. Blaming Apple just adds to the delay on getting them replaced.

So utimately, I ended up restoring my RAM to the factory RAM that Apple had sent me when they repaired my MacBook Pro. I don't know what to tell you all. Sorry.