Elpida Hyper Graveyard

[saaya]

UPDATE:
Kingston, the worlds largest module maker/vendor and a very close partner of elpida has unofficially anounced that they will replace elpida hyper chips with another chip in the immediate future. faulty elpida hyper modules will be replaced with new modules based on another ddr3 chip (which one is unknown so far)

UPDATE2:
Corsair, one of the tier2 module maker/vendor has officially anounced that they are phasing out elpida hyper based modules and are recalling all elpida hyper based inventory from shops and distributors
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...d.php?t=229050

UPDATE3: OCZ and Mushkin are putting elpida hyper based kits on hold as well, at least for now until more testing has been done

UPDATE4: the problems only affected a couple of batches of elpidas ddr3 chips, current batches and PSC chips (they licensed elpidas design) dont seem to have any reliability issues
UPDATE5: to make it more clear, PSC chips dont die at stock volts from what ive seen, they die very quickly with voltages above 1.9v though


thx to karmakazi for the pic

These kits tend to cost quite a lot, and even though they are rated to 1.65v and some are running them fine at above 2v, a lot of them seem to be dieing lately, even at as low as 1.5v vdimm...

If this happened to you with samsung based memory or any other memory chip or you are not sure what chips your sticks use, but they also died at low vdimm, please post your experience here as well, it might not be an elpida hyper problem after all...

please answer as many of the questions below, ideally all of them:
Just quote this post and then add your reply under each question

1.) After how much time did your memory fail? hours? weeks? months?
2.) Did you stress it a lot? (memtest/orthos/gaming)
3.) How did the memory die? Idle, load, reboot?
4.) What exactly happened? freeze, errors, crash, system turned off, system rebooted, blue screen, black screen
5.) What board, pcb rev and bios version did you use?
6.) What speed and timings did you run the memory at when it died?
7.) what speed and timings did you run the memory at most of the time?
6.) What vtt did you run when the memory died?
8.) what vtt did you run the memory at most of the time?

[Helfarch]

All stock settings on a Classified 760 and one stick died, DDR3 2000 C8s. No idea when it happened, it ran with the dead stick installed just showed 2GB ram, tested individualy and then with the dead stick out it went back to 4GB. Sent for RMA.

[saaya]

All stock settings on a Classified 760 and one stick died, DDR3 2000 C8s. No idea when it happened, it ran with the dead stick installed just showed 2GB ram, tested individualy and then with the dead stick out it went back to 4GB. Sent for RMA.

do all 3 memory slots work fine? its possible that a pin or two in the cpu socket is bent or has bad contact which leads to one of the memory channels to be dead/not operational.

what bios did you use and what vtt?
was the stick DOA or did it work fine at first?

[Helfarch]

do all 3 memory slots work fine? its possible that a pin or two in the cpu socket is bent or has bad contact which leads to one of the memory channels to be dead/not operational.

what bios did you use and what vtt?
was the stick DOA or did it work fine at first?

stock as in 0 settings changed with an i7 920, no attempt at OC yet as I had only just installed Win 7. I'll have to check the BIOS version, haven't updated that either.

GSkill ram is plugged into the same slots and working 100%.

[Kabauterman]

I think there is no Graveyard for the Hypers...

they dies like they would

[saaya]

I think there is no Graveyard for the Hypers...
they dies like they would

what do you mean?

[tekjunkie]

I think there is no Graveyard for the Hypers...

they dies like they would

what do you mean?

I think what he means is that there is no specific pattern here(vDimm,VTT etc), they just sporadically die and with my experience I am with him on that.

[Kabauterman]

I think what he means is that there is no specific pattern here(vDimm,VTT etc), they just sporadically die and with my experience I am with him on that.

right...

my 2000C7 runs like hell, and after 1 week I don't used the System I want to boot and one stick was not longer detected... RMA...

also with the 2000C8 what I had before, they runs fine, but after a non specific point they don't want to run stable in Memory Based tests... RMA...

[tekjunkie]

There seem to be at least half a dozen cases of dead elpida hyper based sticks that died nowhere near the known danger zone north of 2v but at a measly 1.65-1.75v... if you are one of the poor b4stards who had one of those sweet sticks roll over and die, please post as many details about it in this thread so we can find out whats causing it, and hopefully prevent it from happening in future

If this happened to you with samsung based memory or any other memory chip or you are not sure what chips your sticks use, but they also died at low vdimm, please post your experience here as well, it might not be an elpida hyper problem after all...

please answer as many of the questions below, ideally all of them:
Just quote this post and then add your reply under each question

1.) How did the memory die? Idle, load, reboot?
2.) What exactly happened? freeze, errors, crash, system turned off, system rebooted, blue screen, black screen
3.) What board, pcb rev and bios version did you use?
4.) What speed and timings did you run the memory at when it died?
5.) what speed and timings did you run the memory at most of the time?
6.) What vtt did you run when the memory died?
7.) what vtt did you run the memory at most of the time?

Kingston HyperX cl8 DDR3-2000(First Kit bought with Hypers)
Bought from Newegg(04/02/2009), was very happy to see them in stock as they were the only ones with Hypers in stock @ that time.The sticks came in with my classified(759), installed them and ran them everything defaults for about 2 weeks. Then as I found time to get into OCing, started to play around with my rig, encountered a ton of BSODs(pretty normal while OCing), decided to run Memtest @ 1.68 vDimm, 7-8-7 200 BCLK 2:10, went to bed after 3 successful passes, woke up in the morning to see a ton of memtest errors. The system then refused to post with all three sticks and found out that one of the sticks went bye bye(had to put in 1 stick @ a time in the same mem slot to find this out).

1.) How did the memory die?
During Overnight Memtest
2.) What exactly happened?
Please refer above
3.) What board, pcb rev and bios version did you use?
Classified 759
4.) What speed and timings did you run the memory at when it died? DDR3-2000, 7-8-7-20
5.) what speed and timings did you run the memory at most of the time?
Mostly @ default(DDR3-1333)
6.) What vtt did you run when the memory died?
Somewhere between 1.4 and 1.45(sorry can't remember)
7.) what vtt did you run the memory at most of the time?
Default(1.2)

I RMAed it to newegg and in the meantime saw the Dom GT 8-8-8 DDR3-2000 kits in stock and ordered them.

Corsair Dominator GT DDR3-2000 cl8(My second set of Hypers)
The Dom GT seemed to require lesser VTT than the HyperXs(1.375) and was happy about that, with being LinX stable @ 200x21 2:10 @ 1.65V 8-8-8.So I increased the volts to 1.68 again for 7-8-7, passes memtest and LinX, so did a Prime95 Blend run overnight, only to wake up and see a BSOD(I think it was MEMORY_MANAGEMENT BSOD).

1.) How did the memory die?
During Overnight Priming
2.) What exactly happened?
Please refer above
3.) What board, pcb rev and bios version did you use?
Classified 759
4.) What speed and timings did you run the memory at when it died? DDR3-2000, 7-8-7-20
5.) what speed and timings did you run the memory at most of the time?
DDR3-2000, 7-8-7-20
6.) What vtt did you run when the memory died?
1.375(+175mV)
7.) what vtt did you run the memory at most of the time?
1.375(+175mV)

So, since I was also waiting for My RMAed HyperX, I was running them fine @ DDR3-2000 7-8-7 in dual channel mode with two sticks for a while before my HyperX(third set of Hypers) came in and it came in as DOA.The PC was not even POSTing with the HyperXs on them @ DDR3-2000, although they did run fine @ DDR3-1333.

So sent the HyperXs and the GT back for a refund(Thanks Newegg) and also thought maybe the mobo had bad RAM slots and was killing the sticks and also RMAed my classified.In the meantime I got myself another board(Foxconn BR), another chip(W3520) and another set of RAM sticks(Patriot DDR3-2000 cl8) that had hypers on them.That was my fourth kit with Hyper on 'em.The patriots are the only ones until now that I never had any problem with(knock on wood).

I was also waiting for the DOM GT 7-8-7 kits to come in stock and was able to pull the trigger on them too to go with my classified.I also got a W3540 in the meantime.

Corsair Dominator GT DDR3-2000 cl7(My fifth kit with Hypers)
The RAM and my classified came in and I was running it fine with 200x21 with RAM 2:10 7-8-7 1.65V and alas after 2 days of mild activity(gaming and stuff), one of the stick degraded and it won't POST @ DDR3-2000 with that degarded stick and would work @ DDR3-1333 so I had to RMA 'em from Corsair.

1.) How did the memory die?
No death, just degraded.
2.) What exactly happened?
Please refer above
3.) What board, pcb rev and bios version did you use?
Classified 759
4.) What speed and timings did you run the memory at when it died? DDR3-2000, 7-8-7-20
5.) what speed and timings did you run the memory at most of the time?
DDR3-2000, 7-8-7-20
6.) What vtt did you run when the memory died?
1.375(+175mV)
7.) what vtt did you run the memory at most of the time?
1.375(+175mV)


Sorry about the long posting.

[saaya]

very nice tek... but the last kit was on BR and not classified right?
or was it on the replacement classified board?

a friend just hinted towards me that some sticks even die with stock voltage and that elpida knows that there is a problem and working on it.
seems they have some problem with the chips... that might explain why they hesitated to launch the elpida hyper chips to begin with...

has anybody tried to revive his dead stick by putting it into the freezer?
this helps with most dead micron sticks, at least temporarily.... if that helps with the elpida chips as well then its most likely a silicon bonding/packaging problem...

[tekjunkie]

very nice tek... but the last kit was on BR and not classified right?
or was it on the replacement classified board?

It was on the replacement Classified. The only sticks that I ever ran on the BR were the GTs (where one of 'em died on the Claasified)in dual channel mode and the Patriots.

a friend just hinted towards me that some sticks even die with stock voltage and that elpida knows that there is a problem and working on it.
seems they have some problem with the chips... that might explain why they hesitated to launch the elpida hyper chips to begin with...

Always thought that either they had problems with the yield(55nm) or the so called copper interconnects.Since both of them were new technologies, I had a hunch that, that might be the case. Thanks for posting this. I hope that the replacement GTs that I got from Corsair live longer and without degrading.

has anybody tried to revive his dead stick by putting it into the freezer?
this helps with most dead micron sticks, at least temporarily.... if that helps with the elpida chips as well then its most likely a silicon bonding/packaging problem...

Sorry, never thought about doing this.

[Xtreme Addict]

1. Adata EE 1800 3x2 8-8-8-24 1.65-1.85v Elpida Hyper (I took off HS)

One stick dead, no boot at all. Some tests on Rampage II Gene if I remember correctly. VTT ~ 1.4v max, VDIMM ~ 1.65-1.8v. Died during overclocking all on AC.


1.) How did the memory die?
no boot
2.) What exactly happened?
Please refer above
3.) What board, pcb rev and bios version did you use?
Rampage II Gene, bios 0809
4.) What speed and timings did you run the memory at when it died?
1600 8-8-8-24 because GENE doesn't like Elpida Hyper and does not clock it well
5.) what speed and timings did you run the memory at most of the time?
New set, never tested, but other sticks in Dual Channel on Rampage II Extreme do 2000 7-8-7-21 @ 1.85v
6.) What vtt did you run when the memory died?
1.375-1.4v
7.) what vtt did you run the memory at most of the time?
I can't say because it's only review sample

Kingston HyperX 2000 CAS8 3x2 Elpida Hyper

One stick died after 10 minutes during installing OS. Booted at 1333 1.5v 9-9-9-24. But before installing OS on SmackOver DX58SO I put it into DFI X58 UT and ran at 1333 CAS9 1.5v and VTT default.

1.) How did the memory die?
no boot
2.) What exactly happened?
Please refer above
3.) What board, pcb rev and bios version did you use?
SmackOver DX58SO, BIOS SO4014P
4.) What speed and timings did you run the memory at when it died?
1333 CAS9 1.5v and VTT default.
5.) what speed and timings did you run the memory at most of the time?
New set, never tested, but other sticks in Dual Channel on Rampage II Extreme do 2000 7-8-7-21 @ 1.8v
6.) What vtt did you run when the memory died?
1.1-1.2v default
7.) what vtt did you run the memory at most of the time?
I can't say because it's only review sample

has anybody tried to revive his dead stick by putting it into the freezer?
this helps with most dead micron sticks, at least temporarily.... if that helps with the elpida chips as well then its most likely a silicon bonding/packaging problem...

I tried, put ADATA and Kingston into DICE and it didn't help.

Corsair DOM GT 1866 CAS7 3x2 directly from Bachus are working 4 months or more without any issue on the same motherboards: SmackOver, R2E, R2 GENE, EVGA X58 SLI, DFI X58 UT, Gigabyte X58 UD5... with voltages VTT 1.2-1.8v, VMEM 1.5v - 1.95v

[saaya]

I tried, put ADATA and Kingston into DICE and it didn't help.

damn...

[jagt]

Corsair Dominator GT 1866MHz 7-8-7-20

1.) How did the memory die?
During LinX testing with maximum memory size

2.) What exactly happened?
System froze. Rebooted and only 4GB was recognized. Tested each stick individually found one stick stone dead.

3.) What board, pcb rev and bios version did you use?
DFI LanParty T3eH8 bios 4/28

4.) What speed and timings did you run the memory at when it died?
2000MHz 7-7-7-20 1.66-1.67v

5.) what speed and timings did you run the memory at most of the time?
2000MHz 8-8-8-20 1.65v - 2000MHz 7-8-7-20 1.66v

6.) What vtt did you run when the memory died?
~1.32v

7.) what vtt did you run the memory at most of the time?
1.3-1.4v

Memory had only been in my system for around one week and had seen very little usage except a fair amount of stress testing (LinX, Prime blend, memtest86+) I had stability at 2000MHz 7-8-7 and was testing 7-7-7 when it happened.

This thread is a great idea!

[pinto]

Three kits dead here:

1 OCZ blade 2000C7, 1 Gkill PS 2000C7 and 1 Corsair GT 2000C7. Every time one stick no longer detect and no windows start or only 4gb are shown. All kits died on R2E, only the Gskill was test on Classified but it's not the board fault because this only one was dead on arrival. My use? between 875 C6 (Vdimm 1.58v VTT 1.3v) and 1100 C7 (never use voltage above 1.68v and VTT above 1.45v).
Really frustrating but every time RMA was really fast with Corsair (great corsair life time warranty); OCZ and Gkill came from a good french shop.

[saaya]

ok, thanks for all the feedback everybody!

we can already conclude that:
its not one board causing the problems
its not one brand/pcb design of mem that has the problems

just like kabauterman said, the kits seem to fail at random, though most of them seem to fail within the first few weeks, is that correct?
so if a kit has been running fine for a while already, it has a good chance of running fine for much longer if not forever...

tekjunkie, i suspect that its the chip bumps/packaging that is causing the problems...
the problems are very similar to nvidia chipset issues and micron d9gmh/gkx issues, only that temperatures and voltages dont seem to matter and chips seem to fail almost entirely at random...

remember, all it takes is a single bump/bond on the chip/package to fail and essentially the entire stick is dead. sure you can replace the chip and get the stick working again, but thats quite a hassle, not only for the end users but also the manufacturers. im very surprised about this cause elpida used to have the most reliable chips when i worked at cellshock... not the best performers, but they performed more than good enough and seemed to be almost indestructable... the rma rates of elpida based ddr2 were simply ridiculous...

[pinto]

My Gskill was dead on arrival but my Blade and GT kits died after 2 months 24/24 Saaya.

[saaya]

My Gskill was dead on arrival but my Blade and GT kits died after 2 months 24/24 Saaya.

what vdimm?
did you stress test them a lot with memtest or play games for a long time?

if yes, then its bad news that they failed after 2 months... so that means even sticks that seem good for months can fail randomly... mhhh

I cannot remember the details of each incident but ONE stick is either half-dead (POST ok at bclock 133MHz only) or dead on Classified mobo @1.78 - 1.87Vdimm within a couple days.

2 kits of Corsair GT C7 3x2G (half dead): 1st set right after the first LN2 benching & 2nd set arrived half-dead

1 kit of OCZ Blade 3x2G (dead): Right after the first LN2 benching

2 kits of SanMax CL9 3x2G (half dead): during air testing for both kits

wow... sorry for all your losses fredyama-sensei!
damn thats a lot of sticks... and whats up with all those DOAs?
it seems that over the past year the amount of memory DOAs has skyrocketed... could it be that shops just put refurbished kits back on the shelves? makes sense, its probably a lot of hassle to test all kits or rma them to the manufacturer and wait for them to come back, plus it costs shipping and takes time... but geez, its almost like you have to buy two kits now to be 100% sure you got a working set of 3 sticks from what im hearing here...

so when benching with high vdimm it seems the sticks fail very fast and almost instantly, but even at low vdimm they degrade or fail after some time... sounds like serious chip issues at elpida...

really good thread i have a kit on elpida non-hypers die on me no idea if those count

are those the same chips and just binned diferently?
if yes, then it seems you have the same issue...
im actually a bit out of the loop about the latest chips...

Bootsy, wow, 12gb at near 2k cas7, thats sweet!
so after how much time did the stick go belly up? around 1-2 months?
did you torture it a lot with memtest or benching or gaming?

tripgood, you got 2 classifieds and a dfi and a br? daymmmm man!

saaya owns so many graveyards, you must like this business

On the topic, is there any Elpida hyper that has survived more than 2 weeks and is still running fine daily?

heheh, actually this is only the third, and well, nobody else seems to start any graveyard topics... personally i think this is the most important information we need to exchange about hardware, when and how does it die... to me thats more important than how high some parts clock... cause whats the point if it dies a week after setting a new record?

im really surprised and actually a bit worried over how this thread exploded in half a day to two pages with some people losing several sticks... i didnt know things were that bad... plus all the doa stuff... though i suspect the doa is people having a dead stick and just sending it back to newegg instead of rmaing it, and newegg puts it back on the shelf instead of rmaing it...

anyhow, i think tomorrow i will collect the lifetime of the sticks, i hope that theres a certain time that, once the sticks surivive past that, you can be pretty sure they are fine, at least most likely...

thanks for all the feedback everybody!

[pinto]

what vdimm?
did you stress test them a lot with memtest or play games for a long time?

if yes, then its bad news that they failed after 2 months... so that means even sticks that seem good for months can fail randomly... mhhh

Lot of games and few max memory tests, never use more than 1.75v and 1.6v for daily/game use.

[emo]

I have the same problem... only one stick will die and another two will have no problem. System still boot and @BIOS only shows 4GB ram.. But inside CPUZ, you can still find 6GB ram and all 3 sticks SPD

[pinto]

+1 cpu-z still see 3 sticks/6gb and windows 4gb.

[Hazzan]

nice topic... Saaya..

I ll waiting this topic..and I will report later with my hyper chipset..

[eva2000]

Only tried 2 kits of Elpida Hyper - 1 out of 2 heh

kit 1: No problems at all with 6GB Corsair Dominator GT 2000 CAS7 which ran up to 1.96v vdimm with 1.65v max cpu vtt but usually run around 1.65-1.74v with 1.3-1.63v cpu vtt for several months now with no problems.

kit 2: Bought 2nd hand off these forums 6GB Kingston 2000 CAS8 - pretty much DOA/1 module failure out of the box - didn't know at the time as it was sometimes detecting 4GB instead of 6GB but recently tested each module on Asus Rampage Extreme and confirmed one module is a dud - full details at http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...d.php?t=226580

[bluehaze]

Dominator GT 1866 C7, 1st set had 1 stick DOA, Second set ran 2000mhz 7-7-7-20@1.68 volt for 2 weeks then computer crashed over night. Was just idling not priming. It wouldn't reboot had to take 1 stick out that was dead computer booted now, Then next time I tried to reboot same thing happened and another stick was dead.

This was with Classified 760 and 1.24v Vcore 1.4v VTT with 10x Mem, 20x Uncore, 200mhz bclk.

[Kabauterman]

I hope Elpida can fix this problems asap!