Installed wrong memory card.?

Question

I wanted to increase the speed of my kid's computer so collected all the specs and info I needed and bought a memory card that the sales guy told me would work. It wouldn't go in right and I think I pushed it too hard and it smelled like hot wires. I took the memory out and compared it to the existing one and sure enough it was just a hare bigger. Tried to turn the computer back on and it won't do anything. The fans start spinning, but it won't boot up. Have I just blown it up and if so, is it worth taking it to a repair shop to possibly fix it?

Answer 1

...That tech should be in the public stocks along with some rotten tomatos, seriously...

Unless your motherboard is one of the bridge boards that's sold by AsRock that allows both DDR and DDR2 memory, there's a good chance it ruined your motherboard (the memory might still be good, but due to voltage differences, the motherboard more than likely fried).

Look at both memory sticks. All memory is designed to fit only one way. There's special notches on the bottom to ensure it will only go in one way. Notice the difference? This prevents putting in the wrong type -- never, ever, force it in (goes with any hardware now, except for AGP/PCI cards, as they often need a gentle but firm push to seat the socket).

If your motherboard isn't an AsRock bridge board, take that memory back with the sales slip and demand your money back for the memory. He not only sold you the wrong speed (your's is 400mhz/the new is 667mhz) memory; he sold you the wrong memory type (your's is DDR/ the new is DDR2 -- they're not compatible at all). Make enough fuss that they'll fix your computer at their cost, too.

The quality of these techs today is becoming more dismal by the year. Something so simple as matching memory (something that wouldn't take them more than 5 minutes to find out) the dude didn't even bother to do that. Now the motherboard is shot.

Don't use that store again for computing needs. Chances are the same mistake will happen again.

Answer 2

It depends, if you computer is not even a year old then yeah take it to the shop. But if it is old anyway, a little RAM won't help that much. Get a new one. I'm sure your kid would love a new one.  

Answer 3

sounds like you've shorted the motherboard or something

yeah, i'd take it to the local computer shop if i were you

Answer 4

hmm, sounds very strange.

can you tell us what is noted on the sticker of the existing and the new memory. interesting is the type - DDR 333 or DDR2-5300, PC 3200 or PC2 4200 - something like this.

this would help a lot.

addendum:

ok, the sales guy is a complete idiot who has not the slightest clue of computers - very bad for you. you fried the mainboard with this wrong memory.

DDR and DDR2 are not compatible, but i wonder how did you manage to put this memory in. it needs a lot of force to put a DDR2 stick in a DDR slot.

it's not worth to fix a 5 year old computer. the cost is almost the same as for a new one, maybe even higher.