jleyrer::blog

Unibody Macbook Pro RAM Madness

The day after Thanksgiving, I took advantage of some great Internet deals and got myself a new unibody Macbook Pro. I opted for one with only 2GB of RAM and also ordered two 2GB sticks of Crucial RAM from Newegg, since it’s much cheaper to buy and install them yourself as opposed to buying a Mac with 4GB already installed.

I got everything a few days later, swapped out the RAM, started transferring everything over from my old machine and about ten minutes into the transfer my new computer froze. After restarting a few times and having the same thing happen each time, I knew something wasn’t right. I searched around a bit and found some articles similar to this one that pointed the finger at my third-party RAM. I was not happy, to say the least. However, I also found cases where people were experiencing this same problem with factory installed memory. Regardless of where the RAM came from, the thing everyone with issues had in common was that they had 4GB installed. Then again, there were reports from people who had 4 gigs installed (factory or third party) that were having no problems at all.

Right around the same time, three of my coworkers and I all got the same model Macbook Pros at work with 4GB of Crucial memory installed in them. Two of us had no problems (I was one of the lucky ones) while the other two were experiencing the same issue as I was at home. The temporary solution, which I had also previously resorted to, was to put one of the original 1GB Hynix (factory) DIMMs in with one of the Crucial DIMMs resulting in a total of 3GB of RAM. Not ideal, but at least it worked.

If you’ve swapped memory on one of the new Pros, you may have noticed that the harness holding the DIMMs in place is not the sturdiest thing in the world. Given how random this problem seemed to be, I started to think that the way the sticks were seated might be a factor. I opened up my personal machine and put the other 2GB stick back in, only this time the two DIMMs were in opposite slots than they were the first time around. I was careful to only push them down far enough so they’d click in, not applying any more pressure than necessary. I started the machine back up and let it sit for an hour or so. Much to my surprise it was still going strong. Now, nearly a day and a half later I haven’t had any recurrences of the problem. Coincidentally, my coworker that was also having issues did the same thing a few days earlier (without telling us) and hasn’t had a system freeze since.

So anyway if you are experiencing this issue, try reseating the DIMMs. It might not work for you, but it’s worth a shot.