I'm getting recent memory test failures in an HP Pavilion g7-1303sa laptop (one month out of warranty :( ). The memory is the factory installed 6GB installed as a 2GG module in the top slot and 4GB in the bottom slot (nearest the access panel). There are only two slots. I've tested with both the built in HP diagnostics and the memtest boot utility and both show failures (actually memtest86+, I think). The HP specs list the max system memory as 6GB but some other sources list it as 8GB.
What's puzzling me is that if I test either of the modules individually in either slot they work absolutely fine even after running a full memtest cycle for a few hours. If I install both modules either way round I get immediate memory test failures.
memtest reports the system memory as being something like 5.5GB which is presumably because the GPU is taking some of that memory for its own use. I can't see any options in the BIOS configuration for changing GPU memory usage. However interestingly memtest reports the error addresses around the 5.6GB - 5.7GB range - bigger than the reported memory and presumably within the area used by the built in GPU if my vague theory is correct.
The manufacturer specs lists the GPU as:
Graphics AMD Radeon HD 6520G Discrete-Class (up to 2.98 GB total memory)
Is this some sort of memory failure, a GPU misconfiguration or failure or is it possible that I could fix it by replacing one or both of the memory modules? If I just workaround the problem by installing only the 4GB module is it likely to be a permanent fix or is the motherboard about to die in some way?
EDIT:
Additional information from the service and maintenance manual:
- 2 customer-accessible/upgradable memory
- Supports dual-channel memory
- Supports up to 8192 MB of system RAM DDR3/1333 MHz (DDR3-1600 (1 GB / 2 GB / 4 GB / 8 GB) memory modules supported as an alternative source for DDR3-1333)
So it sounds like I might be able to use a single 8GB module instead if all else fails.
