RAM Manufacturer Opinions

i measure the temperatures with a tool called: "hardware monitor" and it gives many different temperature measurements throughout the machine.

i ordered the OWC stuff and they too sent me NetList. how long before errors started popping up with yours?

ok Hatter, well, i will hope for the best and push this thing as hard as i can for the next 48 hours and if it works out well, i will send in my apple stuff for the rebate.

i take that back, one DIMM is showing ecc errors now... yay... how do i know if this is normal or not? i restarted the machine and reset the PRAM and now it shows up in the system profiler as OK and the number of errors was at 1 when i restarted... so i guess the next logical question is how many errors is too many errors?

thanks for the help in advance

the1sen,

what is showing you the ECC errors? Is it hardware monitor? My System Profiler and everything else shows mine is OK. Do pop ups appear on the screen?

Thanks for the info.

Michael

in my system profiler, i went to the blue apple, then about this mac, then more info, then i highlighted the "memory" spot and in the right hand window pane, it showed the slot, size, type, speed and status. under the status, one of the DIMMs showed "errors"

i highlighted this DIMM and looked for the number and it showed "1"

i restarted the machine, reset my PRAM, and nothing has shown up since. i am going to run Rember now and see if anything comes up and if it doesn't, i will assume that all is well in the world of 12GB of RAM.

no, there were not any pop-ups advising of RAM issues.

i thank you for taking time to help.

Glad to hear.... so far so good. Is PS behaving better for you? Keeping my fingers crossed for you. May only move from 4 to 6 here. Lack of funds and real need for that much. Have fun.

Michael

FYI, my #2 slot is warmer than my #1. Go figure....

i also hope it works. running AHT in loop all night to make sure all is well in there.

i've noticed some speed increases since doubling the RAM. not as much as when i jumped from 4 to 6 though... mostly, in Bridge. could be a combination of RAM and the Raptor RAID i have in there for that.

filters and NR still take some time, but it's a bit faster. mostly, i notice Lightroom flying. i hope that i have better luck with my owc RAM than Hatter. strangely, i ordered their OWC RAM and they sent their Netlist stuff...

I'm confused, the1sen.

In one post you say your OWC RAM is identical to the Apple RAM you had "down to the part number". In another post you say OWC sent Netlist. Did Apple ship Netlist?

-phil

System Profile unfortunately does not retain error counts across restarts. For that, you would have to look and see if there is a panic.log or look in system.log.

I kept Console system log and system profile -> memory over in the corner so I could glance at them.

If you don't have kernel panics, I don't think there will be a panic.log and most errors should be corrected or parity errors.

If you were having memory errors, then you can begin to worry that bad data is being written to disk. Once replaced and errors gone, then you might need to replace those files or (hate to say) replace from originals. (system, applications after scanning your files with Disk Warrior, TechTool Pro, Speedtools.... )

Let's hope it stays at "1" and that all the changes (more RAM, Raptors, Bridge cache location, etc) work as they should. And get on with enjoying use of your equipment rather than have it "on a lift" doing maintenance 24/7.

I will offer that in the past Apple Hardware Test was not reliable at finding a lot of problem RAM. So people would use it, but then use Memtest. Forbide the thought of testing 12GB. You could open 48 windows in terminal running Memtest on 256MB in each which would only take an hour or two to do 4-5 cycles.

Excellent article on memory:
Mac Pro RAM

Goes into all the temperature, performance, Photoshop, OWC Netlist etc.

- really good timing! on the article 😉

It's possible that OWC is using whatever chips they have on hand to fill orders. Ordering the NetList brand (for $10 more) guarantees you will get that brand. Ordering the OWC may get you that brand, or it might be another. Errors with any brand are possible, which is why the lifetime warranty is important. Is OWC's price, with the rebate factored in, currently the lowest?

OWC's price and replacement policy is great, and since i called the order in, they waived the shipping and upgraded it to 2nd day air. Jinkies, that was nice of them. 🙂

i would think it is possible that they would fill an order with anything they have rather than delay shipment to a paying customer. at least then, if the customer didn't like the RAM or whatever, they'd have an opportunity to use it and hope nothing goes wrong.

incidentally, the RAM Apple gave me had the exact same heat sink as the Netlist stuff, and the Netlist stuff runs just as cool even though they are double the density of the Apple chips.

the RAM i was shipped threw one error at me and hasn't thrown anything since. let's hope it stays that way!

HATTER! where do you find this stuff sir? GREAT ARTICLE. i believe you, Hatter, are a rock star of epic proportions. thank you.

Early on, I heard of MacSurfer and started checking it daily. then I setup my own bookmarks so I could scan Mac news sites each day.

Thanks for the "hats off!"

PS: I used Boot Camp 1.2 and running Vista, because Tiger won't download 4GB files properly and has better network performance than Mac Pro ;-(

I "met" Lloyd a l-o-n-g time ago beta testing. I knew of his problems with Mac Pro and RAM, but it was
http://www.hardmac.com which mentioned his new article.

He is also heavily into Photoshop (if you check his blog) and I thought I posted a URL in your own (long) thread on problems you were having. (I don't post urls for fun or something, I do hope folks take a moment to read what is there!).

March 21st www.AppleInsider.com had a note on a issue and bug in CS2 and Tiger - over my head - but another small tip.

My dad bought us the Britannica so I/we use to get out dozens of volumes.... and read. So I like that between Google-Wiki etc you have it at your fingers.

Wow! 12G of RAM. You have more RAM than anyone I know. So, now I'm really curious - is it all it is supposed to be? Are you feeling the speed or watchfully nervous?

Did your wife make some cookies for the occasion?

I'm still trying to decide on 2x2G for 7G total, or 2x1G for 5G total. If I get the 2x2G, I'm definitely making brownies.

there were 2 identifying markers on the RAM i got from OWC.

1 was the imprint of "Netlist" on the heat sink, and the other was the bar coded area with the part number and/or serial numbers printed on a sticker.

i hope that helps.

she did make cookies. 🙂

you know, when i added 2GB and jumped to 6GB, i noticed more of a difference than the 12GB. the machine is the same, speed wise with what i do. perhaps i am doing something wrong... i don't know.

it still pages and quits adobe apps randomly also.

the1sen,

Check out the hatter post under the CS3 Apps UB topic about the vm issue and the plugin to stop vm sharing. May be your issue.

Michael