Good idea to format after new ram is installed?

M

mobusta1

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I have 4 gigs in a vista 64bit laptop. I did a memtest and got a bunch of errors so I'm sending the ram back to newegg and I'll be using the 2 x 512mb dimms that HP sent me when I bought the laptop. My question is, is whether or not it is a good idea to format my PC again when I get my 4 gigs again from newegg.
 
i think that would be totally pointless, but i might be wrong (it happens sometimes)
 
SoAndSo said:
i think that would be totally pointless, but i might be wrong (it happens sometimes)
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Completely pointless. A RAM upgrade (or downgrade) should never require a format, unless your RAM was /so/ bad that your OS installation was corrupted.
 
Agreed, I don't see any need to reformat when you install new RAM (and your errors couldn't be caused by the OS anyway, as Memtest doesn't run under Windows). Quite besides that, I only think reformatting is worthwhile for platform changes anyway.
 
Wow...people will reformat for anything these days. As long as the OS supports the replacement memory, which it does, you'd have no reason to do a reinstall.
 
Remember you should reformat anytime you change ANYTHING! New webcam? Format! New thumdrive? Format and then format the the thumbdrive! New Ram? You got it!!!

All j/king aside, no. Don't format. Just put the new ram in when it arrives, and you're set.

I had to both replace the RAM, AND do a destructive recovery on an HP desktop though because it was all kinds of screwed up. Then again all 4 sticks were bad, and had been bad for some time.
 
I've had instances in the past few years where bad RAM did cause the OS to become corrupt, soooo... the recommendation I'd make is that as long as the OS has been and continues to start up without issues - even with the bad RAM in place - then you should be OK when the new RAM arrives and is installed.

If, however, you have any problems after the new RAM gets installed, if the boot process screws up, if you get Registry or HIVE errors of any kind, popup messages after the Desktop appears with HIVE/Registry info, etc, then yes, a reinstallation of the OS could be in order.

Reinstall the OS just because of new RAM? No... reinstall the OS because of new RAM where the old RAM caused the OS to crap itself? Sure, but you'd know if that had happened because the current installation wouldn't be functional in the first place.

Seems pretty simple to me... ;)
 
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