Disaster averted...by moving the memory modules to non-interleaved ("dual channel" marketword) slots, memtest86 could identify that the upper 512MB is what had errors...so I got her machine back online with zero memory errors by just yanking the one offending DIMM, which she now intends to replace. Yay.
I have a sneaking suspicion that she's going to replace this Corsair 2700LL (2-2-2-5) memory with either a lower quality corsair module or whatever she can get her hands on for $50. So no interleaving, and also having to dumb-down the timings.
But at least she's talking to me and not spending hours sulking because her computer isn't behaving as a computer should.
In other news, as I used my computer as an example in all this and to prove it wasn't her memory controller (I put her dimms in my machine and ran memtest), I noticed that the northbridge heatsink/fan has fallen off. It was lying on the back of my video card. I'm surprised it didn't short anything important, the GPU is right under that, all its backside terminating resistors hanging out in easy shorting range of the heatsink.
This was a replacement fan...a Thermaltake "chipset" fan...which had to be stuck onto the northbridge using adhesive thermal tape rather than connected to the nForce2's pushpin holes...the holes in the fan itself could not be convinced to line up.
So I ordered a Zalman 'silent' model, the only thing I can seem to find that 1) isn't as large as a CPU fan, and 2) will actually mount to the nForce2's pushpin holes. I wish I had found a powered replacement, but given this experience with the last powered replacement, I'm wary of making the same mistake again. Since my machine has been running without a fan on the northbridge for god knows how long, it clearly isn't necessary anyway.
Which, since I can't trust fry's to carry anything other than the Thermaltake model, I will be waiting to arrive in the mail sometime next week.
I have a sneaking suspicion that she's going to replace this Corsair 2700LL (2-2-2-5) memory with either a lower quality corsair module or whatever she can get her hands on for $50. So no interleaving, and also having to dumb-down the timings.
But at least she's talking to me and not spending hours sulking because her computer isn't behaving as a computer should.
In other news, as I used my computer as an example in all this and to prove it wasn't her memory controller (I put her dimms in my machine and ran memtest), I noticed that the northbridge heatsink/fan has fallen off. It was lying on the back of my video card. I'm surprised it didn't short anything important, the GPU is right under that, all its backside terminating resistors hanging out in easy shorting range of the heatsink.
This was a replacement fan...a Thermaltake "chipset" fan...which had to be stuck onto the northbridge using adhesive thermal tape rather than connected to the nForce2's pushpin holes...the holes in the fan itself could not be convinced to line up.
So I ordered a Zalman 'silent' model, the only thing I can seem to find that 1) isn't as large as a CPU fan, and 2) will actually mount to the nForce2's pushpin holes. I wish I had found a powered replacement, but given this experience with the last powered replacement, I'm wary of making the same mistake again. Since my machine has been running without a fan on the northbridge for god knows how long, it clearly isn't necessary anyway.
Which, since I can't trust fry's to carry anything other than the Thermaltake model, I will be waiting to arrive in the mail sometime next week.