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I'm using an upgraded HP workstation xw6600, although the only changes are the GPU (AMD Radeon HD 7850) and another 2 SSDs.

About 2 months after adding my second SSD, I went to turn on my pc, but it just beeped 5 times and didn't post, indicating a memory error. I went through all the ram, individually taking one out, and trying to boot, this didn't work until I got to slot 5 and 6. If the ram was out of slot 5, windows would only use 8Gb of ram, but slot 6 allow 12Gb. Whenever I try and add the 8th ram stick back in, it will just beep and not POST. It came with 8 ram sticks, and I had not touched the internals for over a month before this.

I also can't change anything in BIOS as the HP bios is terrible.

I would assume that the best option would be to reset the BIOS by taking out the CMOS battery, which I can access, but haven't done, just in case there is a better way to fix it.

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  • 1
    Sounds like a hardware issue. Performing a CMOS reset likely won't resolve the problem you describe.
    – Ramhound
    Commented Sep 11, 2023 at 17:27
  • Would you suggest I just get a new motherboard?
    – Chromegism
    Commented Sep 11, 2023 at 17:30
  • if you can't change anything in BIOS then why would you reset the BIOS - since you can't change anything, nothing has changed
    – Jaromanda X
    Commented Sep 12, 2023 at 0:03

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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Some motherboards require RAM in matching slots, so that might explain why removing slot 6 disables also slot 5.

From your tests, it seems clear that the 8th RAM is bad and needs to be replaced. The motherboard works fine without it, so no need to replace that.

I suggest to replace the bad RAM with another that is totally identical to the replaced one, meaning exactly the same model. Mixing different RAMs can have unexpected effects.

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