Hi,I bought a matched pair of Corsair Twinx 1024 PC 3200C2 RAM and replaced two Corsair CMX512-3200C2 sticks. I have a Gigabyte Triton GA-K8NF 9 board (nForce 4) with Athlon 64 3500+ (water cooled), two Seagate 160Gb SATA disks in RAID 0 array. Plus one older disk for backup purposes.All was well until I decided to try the two 512Mb sticks of RAM, to have 3Gb of memory. Windows XP SP2 (all patched up) started normally. I started FSX and got BSOD immeditaley. Rebooted, another BSOD even before system loaded. (Told me that my BIOS was corrupt!!) Rebooted again, went into Safe mode and couldn't reboot anymore. Explorer.exe hung and when I finally pressed the reset button I started getting all sorts of funny messages (NTLDR missing was the first). Well, to cut a long story short, I removed the 512Mb sticks, but could not start the system. Then I went and flashed the BIOS. That probably did it for the RAID array....I formatted one of the disks, installed win XP. The other disk I couldn't format (it would go formatting for one hour than complain that it cannot finish) until I tried the Seagate wizard. That did the trick, both disks are perfectly OK (or so the wizard claims). I ran some tests...Now, my questions are:1. What caused the mess in the first place? Was it those two 512Mb of RAM? Was there a clash between the -1024 and -512 sticks? I mean, corrupt BIOS???2. I am reluctant to try again, but I would like to use all 3Gb of memory. Is it safe to do so? Or is Twinx 1024 PC 3200C2 so different to CMX512 3200C2?3. If more than two RAM banks are occupied on the K8NF9, DDR drops from 400 to 333. Why? How much would that affect performance?Well, no more RAID0 for me. I see an increase in loading times (just the system), but what the heck. I'll have the system on one disk and boths sims on the other anyway. Any advice appreciated! :)Regards,Jure

Jure; Check corsair's web site for thier recomendation on your Mobo. On my old asus board they claim that thier memory won't run atDDR400. Also they show that the more ram you try to run on it...thelower the speed has to be.

Hi,"3. If more than two RAM banks are occupied on the K8NF9, DDR drops from 400 to 333. Why? How much would that affect performance?"Often BIOS throttles down the memory speed when the memory sticks differs between bank A and B. I had this problem with my old computer when mixing 2x1 1024MB and 2x1 512MB sticks. I forced the memory to to 400MHz by disabling auto settings in BIOS and setting the frequency manually and it worked all right. No problems for me. You'd better consult your mobo manual and check the Gigabyte forum for additional info on how to change the BIOS settings for your memory.Ulf B

Yikes! I've been there.I am not sure what happened there, but I have personally crashed RAIDed servers before, doing about the same thing. Windows Server + SCSI + RAID arrays are tricky, and so are SCSI controllers...very finicky at the boot level. I learned a lesson to be extra careful with the above...RhettAMD 3700+ (@2.5 ghz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (94.47), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 GB Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8, WD 250 gig 7200 rpm SATA2, CoolerMaster Praetorian

Thanks guys. :)I'll research this a bit more in detail to be sure. I am back, more or less, system running smoothly, FS9 installed with just basic stuff for now. Of course, loading times are noticeably longer now, although I do not see the difference in FS itself. Which is what I am after. I installed FE, GEPro, Aerosoft EDDF and FlyTampa LOWW plus LVL-D 767 to test things out. So far, I am happy. As I said, no more RAID for a while at least. :) The two SATA disks are doing their job adequately. This was, in fact, my first ever loss of disk(s) and I don't care to repeat it, LOL. Fingers crossed.So, if I understand correctly, basically RAM shouldn't have caused the mayhem with the RAID? I'll double-check before I stick anything onto the board again, that's for sure. Jure

>So, if I understand correctly, basically RAM shouldn't have>caused the mayhem with the RAID? Should not have, in a perfect world. But I have seen stranger things corrupt a RAID array, including simply PLUGGING IN an external SCSI device to an SCSI LVD port. Instant boot sector trash across the array.I have seen enough of RAID at work, to where I do not care to have RAID at home.>I'll double-check before I>stick anything onto the board again, that's for sure. >You might want to check at Gigabytes's site, or the ram maker's site, maybe there is a ram module compatibility issue with those boards and that particular RAM.RhettAMD 3700+ (@2.5 ghz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (94.47), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 GB Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8, WD 250 gig 7200 rpm SATA2, CoolerMaster Praetorian

> But I have seen stranger things corrupt a RAID array, including > simply PLUGGING IN an external SCSI device to an SCSI LVD port. > Instant boot sector trash across the array.Not really that strange if the array was on the same bus. An external SCSI port is unlikely to be hotpluggable (I don't even know if they exist). You should never stick an LVD device into a SCSI port while the port is powered on. The worst I've seen is a number of fried IC's on the controller after plugging in an LVD library to an external port which set off the VESDA in the computer room. Nasty. :(I repair server equipment and hear the ole, 'we've never shut the server down to replace a tape drive before...?' and the above is the exact reason why I refuse to do it. It's unpredictable though you usually do get away with it and it's definitely not recommended.To stay on-topic... while it's nice to have the added speed of a RAID0, the fact that you've at least doubled your chances of losing all your data has always been the sticking point for me. Stick to your two separate drives.