Can Ram be tested if the Mac doesn't boot? Sounds like a funny joke, but please read on....

I guess I learned a very expensive and hard lesson. I picked up my Mac yesterday and they did install the OWC chips with the new logic board. A different tech was at the counter and said their weren't any special notes that he tried anything special with the OWC ram sticks. It was the 2nd set and not the first ones that I tried to install. It is possible that I didn't give it enough time to boot and didn't realize that they were just needing time to install. I had this bad habit of keeping my mac faced down when I would install them. I would lift it up partially to see if the home screen would show. I wish their was some kind of sound or beep or something that would indicate that it was working properly. Even when the screen is standing in the proper position it loads in very dim to indicate that it is booting up. Anyway, I am loving it so far! I am currently able to have open many of the intensive applications I like to use at the same time and it's quick! Some of them would freeze or slow the Mac up. It couldn't come at a better time also. I have a little time to think of ideas that would help me to enhance my virtual lessons and also to do the boring paperwork! I'm grateful to apple for getting the part to my tech so I could have it for this week! Yes, the price tag for doing something stupid to an already outdated computer will sting for a while, but now I can move forward and look forward to the future! Thanks for everybody's input and advice!

Edit to my above post: I mentioned that the cause was probably due to not giving it enough time to boot, but I tried so many times that it could have been other factors . If your ram doesn't work right away be very very careful or take it to a tech is my advice!

Thanks Babowa! It's been a long hard journey! I had only the use of my Iphone. The external drive on my old mac not being able to use a more updated OS didn't help either. Even this forum was hard to get to. When I clicked on filters my browser didn't do anything. Now I'm good! Hoping I can fix the external as I did once before to back it up.

Hi Paul,

It shows up in the system report USB, but doesn't mount in the Mac. My virtual PC on the mac says Failure to create a proxy for this device. Doesn't show up at all in disk utility. Tomorrow I plan to be more aggressive with it. Although I tried a network recovery of the OS and it didn't finish or I can't remember specifically. I should probably mention that I had problems before with this drive and zapping the pram on the old mac did the trick. However, it didn't recently unfortunately. Now that I have my newer mac working I think I can troubleshoot better. I might need a diagnostic tool like disk warrior, but haven't upgraded in many years. Thanks for your help. I'll keep you posted.

Hi Paul, Yes, that might be one of the reasons why I am having problems. I can't upgrade OS's due to my music software being too expensive to upgrade to use it. This is the reason I created the external drive was to use a more current OS, which is High Sierra. I have a history with this external. I used it on my old mac and it was running good. I needed to use it on my newer or fixed mac and then when I brought it back to my old mac funky things started to happen. I did things to get it back like zapping the pram and it worked! As of today, after a restart the fixed mac and and disk utilities recognize it, but gave me an error that it can't be fixed and I should back everything up. It also says that it is not mounted, so it's not showing up in the finder anymore.....I should tell you I left my mac for a bit while I was doing something in my house. Well, I hope I can at least get to it via software before I try to erase it. This is the error log if anyone knows what it means? Thanks. Repairing file system.

Volume is already unmounted.

Performing fsck_hfs -fy -x /dev/rdisk3s2

Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.

Checking extents overflow file.

Checking catalog file.

The volume 1ST HD IN HUB 2tb Drive for Backup could not be verified completely.

File system check exit code is 8.

Restoring the original state found as unmounted.

File system verify or repair failed.

Operation failed…

Hi Paul,

I just read of some software through a youtube video (not sure if I could say the name on this board) that I could buy for around $20.00 that should bring it back to life. However, I may wait a bit before I try it. Thanks for your help....sidenote....I am loving the 64gb. upgrade. At this point I am just opening up applications and watching how fast they seem to be working and so far I can open as many tabs as I need to on my browser without worry that the other apps will slow down or crash! Namely my Virtual Box. It is really the reason that I bought the ram. Before the upgrade I could open it up, but needed to use the bare minimum screen size and it would freeze if I did anything worth value. Now , after it takes time to fully load it moves almost as fast as my internal mac....very cool.....I do realize though as the apps get more robust and I want to do more that it will affect it, but for now it is going great! Expensive for my mistakes, but I'm very happy!

Thank You for the suggestion Babowa, I did go to the western digital passport ultra website and it appears that I have downloaded a diagnostic /repair utility for it. However, it seems to need a restart for it to be mounted so I will need to wait until tomorrow for this.

It's looking like I have bigger problems. I was using virtualbox for a few days with my new ram and LOVING it, but the first thing this morning It wouldn't load. (Kernal driver not installed Rc= -1908) I tried many things tonight and nothing fixed it. Disappointing. This is one of the main reasons I bought the extra ram. Judging from their message boards it doesn't sound like a simple fix. I'm just puzzle how it could happen. It was fine for two days! I'll keep you posted. Thanks.

Hi Guys,

I didn't want to leave you hanging. I did download Western Digital software to diagnose and fix it. I was able to see everything on the hard drive. I think I backed up everything, but want to go back to it to make sure ( I did it manually.) Now I have bigger fish to fry. I am trying to figure out why I am getting a Kernal is not loading when I try to use Virtual Box. It was working great for a few days and now it won't open up a file or I can't even install a fresh copy. I have been given advice on how to fix this, but so far nothing seems to work. My guess, after going through terminal that a kext won't be uninstalled by a different software. The funny part is this is the reason why I went through all of the trouble to upgrade the ram.My luck seems to be getting better and better these days! Thanks for all your help! I'll keep you posted.