T43 with bad ram slot

[drewwhite]

Hey smart people (notice how i butter you up)

I have a t43p that is supposed to have 2GB of ram. I started having problems and noticed that I was down to 1GB. I replaced the chip and was back up to 2g, for a few days. Now I'm down to 1g again and swapping the chips themselves does nothing. I think the socket itself is bad. It's the one on the bottom of the machine. My questions for the community are:

1) Is it feasible to just replace the socket?
2) Can I just stick a 2GB chip in the other slot under the keyboard?
3) Is there a brilliant 3rd solution that will magically cost little, be easily accomplished and let me upgrade to 4GB of ram? And maybe get me a pony?

Thanks for any help
-Drew

[zdriver]

The key question is, is the T43 still under warranty?
If it is out of warranty and you have good soldering skills, a low watt & fine tip iron, the problem is likely to be one or more cold solder joints on the ram socket to motherboard. You need to touch up those connections by carefully reheating them.
Before attempting that, I would carefully clean the socket ram slot connections with contact cleaner and see if that corrects the issue.

I believe the 2gb sodimm will work, I never tried it in the T43's that I have owned, but I am sure other forum members can verify this one way or the other.

[drewwhite]

The machine is not under warranty any longer.

I have no soldering skills. I'm really just a user not a tweaker. Although if the 2Gig chip in the other slot will not work, I'm game to try it. Thanks for the thought, zdriver.

Pardon an ignorant question, what would I use as contact cleaner? Alcohol? Lighter fluid?

[zdriver]

Isopropyl alcohol would be fine & some folded paper or a qtip to get at the slot contacts. You can buy contact cleaner in a small spray can at electronic stores - radio shack, fry's etc.

A 2gb 533mhz sodimm is currently 25 bucks, so that may be the most cost effective solution to get you back to maximum memory.
This is one I would recommend...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductRe ... 6820148060

[drewwhite]

Unfortunately the 2Gig chip in one slot won't work. Each location has a max of 1Gig. Cleaning did not seem to help either.

Do anyone know where I can find a video of the re-soldering procedure? Thanks.

[richk]

I don't have a 2GB chip handy, but I'm sure I have used one in a T43. Make sure you have the latest BIOS.

[citrixscu]

I've had the same problem for a few years on my T43. At least it was the most easily-accessible slot that was affected. Different modules did not help either. Keep a screwdriver handy and keep your eye on free/top or taskmgr.exe

[osetivo]

Unfortunately the 2Gig chip in one slot won't work. Each location has a max of 1Gig. Cleaning did not seem to help either.

'Today' I realized I only had 1GB in my T43p, so I decided to add as much as I could. A quick bit of googling indicated a max of 2GB. So I opened the optional DIMM door to find it empty, so I figured I had 1GB internal and a single empty slot.

I bought a 2GB SO-DIMM figuring the extra 1GB would be at worst inaccessible; however, my machine would not boot. I reset the 2GB SIMM a couple of times without success. I felt pretty certain that most PCs will run with more physical memory than is accessible, so I figured I had a bad SIMM.

I wasn't looking forward to returning it, and I wasn't 100% certain that it would work with 3GB, so I decided to replace the internal memory with the 2GB, if possible. Found the T43p manual online which showed that the 1GB was a single DIMM, so....

Opened my machine and replaced the original 1GB with the 2GB DIMM and Voila, it booted and utils show 2GB physical memory, better yet it runs faster. Just for s**ts & giggles, I decided to put the 1GB in the optional DIMM slot figuring that it wouldn't boot (like before), except that it did.

So maybe the optional DIMM is 1GB max, but the internal slot with work with a 2GB DIMM, at least for my T43p model 2867-5DU (2.0Ghz 15" 1GB machine).

$0.02

[killer]

Very interesting. Thank you for that because the wife's T43p could do with a boost.

[Brad]

I have not seen any trouble with a 2gb chip in either slot in several T43/T43p's. Of course the OS will only recognize 2gb even if you happen to have the other slot filled.

Brad

[AlexDBall]

Hi i had a similar problem with a T43 and the solution was to put a stack of paper between the "faulty" memory slot (with module installed) and the RAM cover. i removed the paper a couple of days later and for the next 3 months i had it, it was running fine with 2GB (2x1GB).

Also, i have tested a 2GB module in a T43 at work and it works. But 2x2GB does not. The highest i could go was 3GB 1GB+2GB.

Regards,
Alex

[Xenomorph]

Interesting that 2+1 works.

Just keep in mind that you lose Dual-Channel when doing that.