Hardware Do I have faulty RAM?

[Y05h1]

I have had 6 GB (3 x 2 GB) of Corsair RAM for a few months now. When I first ordered them, I built my system, plugged in the RAM, booted, and everything was fine, until about 10 minutes later my system was failing to boot up my OS. After plenty of testing around, using memtest86, I was able to locate the stick of RAM that was causing the problem. Memtest86 showed all red when I booted with only that stick in the machine.

So I left it out, and booted without it. Decided, oh well, might as well RMA later, it has a life-time warranty anyways...

And then after a few months had passed, and I remembered that I had that memory lying around, I decided it was time I did something about it. But of course I made sure to try it first to make sure I wasn't being crazy. So I put it in, ran memtest86, and it was all perfect! Except after using my machine for about 20 mins, again... failed.

Now here's the thing: the postage fee of returning it would be nearly expensive enough to purchase a new stick of RAM! Seems silly to return it... but at the same time, I can't get compatible RAM without buying them in sets of at least 2 sticks, which picks up the price. So... both bad solutions.

But, could it be possible that there's something wrong with the RAM that isn't hardware related? Something fixable perhaps? Considering it takes a bit of time for it to fail... I'd just like to know if there's any chance before I reach for my wallet...

Edit: @Hakoda.
Yes, tried different slots, tried different amounts of RAM, and it's definitely the one stick... 6 slot MB (Core i7).

Running Ubuntu LiveCD for a while is probably a good idea. The tendency though, whilst running on my Ubuntu install, has been that it works at first, then starts to become unresponsive after a while. Applications stop responding, and soon enough nothing responds anymore, meaning I need to force-shutdown.

I'm just confused as to how a stick of RAM can work just for while like that, before completely messing up? And couldn't find any search results for anyone having similar problems.

I guess I should also contact Corsair's tech support.

 

[Hakoda]

I'm assuming you tried a different slot right? Could be the MB's slot. Should be 4 slots as its the standard nowadays.

EDIT: If it was the slot, Memtest would have failed. Hmmph. That's a head-scratcher. Run an Ubuntu LiveCD for 20 minutes, see if you get a kernel panic or something.

64-bit OS right?

 

[Madridi]

In my humble opinion, you have faulty RAM. No way around that.. It also doesnt mean anything that it takes time to fail.

That being said, I would talk to Corsair's customer service. They might not care whether you return it or not. Not likely, but worth a shot.

I experienced bad RAM myself about a year ago. It was OCZ Platinums. The funny thing is, all three were bad. Luckily the new 3x2 were all good (Memtest)

 

[Fishaman P]

Make sure Memtest86 is sane. I used it and I thought I had faulty RAM, and then I realized: The addresses Memtest86 was giving me were not in the range of mem I had. I had 2x2GB, and it was giving something at the 4.4GB range... not enough CPU cache to do that.