I might build a new PC

[Harrison]

Crucial normally carry lifetime warranties on their ram so definitely contact them. However, if you purchased the ram via Novatech contact them instead first as they have been great for me in the past when needing to do an RMA on hardware. If something is still under warranty, but they can't obtain a direct replacement, they have offered me a new for old of equivalent price asking me to pick something up to a certain value from their existing site/catalogue, so a great service.

[Stephen Coates]

Thanks, I will send Novatech and email some time.

[Stephen Coates]

I sent Novatech an email.

Lets see what happens.

[Stephen Coates]

I posted the RAM back to Novatech.

Meanwhile I'm back to the old Windows 2000 Pentium III with 320MB of PC100.

Anyone got any suggestions for what I could replace the faulty RAM with as I don't think Crucial make this particular one any more?

[Harrison]

Corsair. It's the only make of ram I use these days. Their XMS ram is very good for the price. What type of ram is it you need?

[Demon Cleaner]

I often used G.E.I.L. and lately Patriot (which runs now together with another 8GB of Corsair XMS3 DDR3-1333), both very good in my opinion.

[Harrison]

I've had issues with GEIL ram in the past. In 2 systems I built/repaired it was bad, and in another it refused to work with the motherboard, so I avoid it. As with any make of anything though, bad experiences put you off using it. I've never had compatibility issues with Corsair ram, although someone did say recently to me they had compatibility issues with XMS ram, but I think they hadn't checked the correct type they actually needed for their motherboard.

[Stephen Coates]

Corsair. It's the only make of ram I use these days. Their XMS ram is very good for the price. What type of ram is it you need?

DDR2 PC2-6400 if your first post in this topic is anything to go by.

Unfortunately I'm still not too knowledgeable on what is available these days.

Novatech have returned my memory to Crucial so I still have to wait for them. No idea what they will do.

[Stephen Coates]

Novatech finally got back to me yesterday. Took a while.

Anyway, they offered me some Corsair XMS2 memory as a replacement. I got a 2x2GB pair, so a total of 4GB, so I get 2GB more than I used to have .

It came this morning and seems to work fine.

Now to sort out some SATA optical drives. I'd like to get a blu ray drive and a DVD-RW drive, then I can scrap IDE in this new machine.

[Harrison]

Sony Optiarc is worth getting as its the same company as the old NEC (they merged) and the drives are very good at reading and writing everything.

I've got an Sony Optiarc Blu-Ray RW too and that is great.

When you mention getting a Blu-Ray drive, are you thinking reader or writer? I would recommend spending the extra and just buying a BD writer outright, then you won't need a separate DVD-RW.