I replaced the stock RAM in my girlfriends black macbook last night and the original ram had a white powder on it, mostly near the contacts. Is this normal. I have replaced the RAM in my macbook, mbp, and old powerbooks and have never seen this.
It is clearly MaCrack, which Steve like sto sprinkle on to get you hooked.He has been working with the CIA and Afghan fighters to develop a highly potent strain of the stuff.
Gold doesn't oxidize, and copper corrosion isn't white. The only other metal heavily used in PCBs in tin for the solder. If that's the case, then it would appear that this DIMM was improperly masked during the assembly process. Otherwise, I'm not sure what it is. I was going to say coke.
But yeah, send it back if you can. It might be some FR4 dust (PCB material) that got locked in during the conformal coating process. I didn't think RAM DIMMs were conformally coated, though.
That IS corrosion from the RAM using cheap assed aluminum alloys for the traces and only gold plating the alloy for the contact patches. Aluminum traces are a lot cheaper than copper or gold ones.
I heard somewhere that the slots were particularly tight in the Macbook, and that this non-conductive stuff was being used to make installing the RAM easier.
Comments
Almost looks like corrosion, what do you guys think is going on?
ANTHRAX
Almost looks like corrosion, what do you guys think is going on?
I would say the same thing. That's weird tho...
But yeah, send it back if you can. It might be some FR4 dust (PCB material) that got locked in during the conformal coating process. I didn't think RAM DIMMs were conformally coated, though.
That is Micron memory?
I believe I read something about thermal paste on the memory sticks, but it sounds silly.
That is Micron memory?
It does appear to be the micron logo.
Does it still work?
cheers.
They still worked but the computer was running VERY VERY slow, even for just 512mb RAM is was slow.
I bought 1GB and put it in, so the computer works fine now. Nothing to send back, unless I want apple to replace 2 256dimms, which I won't use.
David