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First post, by Rolandradio

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Hi,

Accept a non-ECC mainboard an ECC RAM module ?
I have the MB896HIL and with the DDR2 533 1GIG ECC RAM everyting is silence. (no screen no beeps no keyboard led's light up).
This mainboard works and was tested with another RAM module, but I don't know which type that was.
Another mainboard the MB896IL almost the same model, does also nothing.

Are iBase and i-BT the same brands ?

Specs:
Pentium-M740
DDR2 non ecc max 1 gig 400 or 533MHz

Reply 1 of 6, by cyclone3d

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I was just looking this particular subject up a couple days ago.

You will need regular (non-ECC) RAM for a board that doesn't support ECC.

Yamaha modified setupds and drivers
Yamaha XG repository
YMF7x4 Guide
Aopen AW744L II SB-LINK

Reply 2 of 6, by dionb

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ECC vs non-ECC itself is unlikely to be the problem. That would leave you with a few unused bits. The real issue is registered vs unbuffered RAM. They require a different way of addressing by the memory controller, so most controllers can only do one or the other.

Server boards generally need registered RAM and so most ECC is registered, inversely unbuffered ECC is very rare.

Post the exact DIMM model code to be sure.

In any even the i915GM GMCH on that board doesn't support ECC, so even if it were to work it would be wasted:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_c … mobile_chipsets

Reply 4 of 6, by cyclone3d

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Rolandradio wrote:

KVR533D2E4/1G 1.8V

From a flea market, both of us forgot to look ECC or non-ECC. Normal the seller knews its for a regular consumer computer and that's always non-ECC.

Just looked up the part #. It is ECC-unbuffered.

Yamaha modified setupds and drivers
Yamaha XG repository
YMF7x4 Guide
Aopen AW744L II SB-LINK

Reply 5 of 6, by shamino

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As dionb mentioned, the typical show-stopper (often mis-attributed to ECC) is whether the module is Registered or Unbuffered. Those cannot be mixed and they have to match what the board requires. However, it looks like that's not the problem here. I found the same as cyclone3d that these are apparently Unbuffered ECC, not Registered.

It's a longshot, but try resetting the CMOS settings before attempting to boot with this RAM. Maybe there's something stored in the settings that's keeping this RAM from working.
It's odd that it's not beeping. Normally if there was a RAM issue most BIOSes would beep at you.

The only desktop (expecting unbuffered memory) motherboards I've encountered that would refuse to boot with unbuffered ECC memory modules were DDR1 Dells like the GX260 and GX270, etc.
In the DDR1 and SDRAM era, every non-Dell motherboard I've used has been indifferent to the extra 8 bits of bus width provided by an ECC module. Those bits just go unused and the memory works fine.

Unbuffered ECC is fairly common pre-DDR2, but I suppose by the time of DDR2 maybe it wasn't common anymore, and maybe desktop boards in the DDR2 era might have developed a Dell-like attitude problem against running it.
I don't know, I've never used anything ECC in the DDR2 era or later. All my ECC stuff is DDR1 or PC100/133.

Reply 6 of 6, by Rolandradio

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Reset BIOS, still not working, why this mainboard have no Post beeps without RAM ?
This mainboard in strange, on google the exact model is not found. I have the MB896IL and the MB896HIL both with the same problem.
When a mainboard only has CPU and PSU and stiil no beeps, the mainboard is defective.

Are iBase and i-BT the same brands ?

Solved !
iBase (ibase technology i-BT) MB896IL works with this RAM module
RAM module:
Samsung D2S0533-D1G DDR2 1GB 533MHz non ECC

Not all non ECC mainboards support ECC RAM, simply test different types of RAM to be sure !