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Home Forums RAM Chip type in 128K — #3 RAM Chip type in 128K — #3
Post #3 by stevep
Source ForumRAM Chip type in 128K — #3
CategoryTroubleshooting
Post DateSun, 6 May 2007 - 00:19
Original URLhttps://68kmla.org/bb/threads/ram-chip-type-in-128k.8184/
Post
These are 4164 DRAMs. That's a 64kbit (bit, not byte) by 1 chip. These have not been made in a longgggg time. You can find them, however, on old PCs (the very first generation of IBM 8088-based PCs, for example), among other bits of ancient trash.
Be advised that the error codes are not reliable. The boot routine doesn't do a very sophisticated test. It just writes a pattern, and expects to see it come back. Any discrepancy is flagged as a memory chip problem, but it could be a lot of other things, too. You should do a careful visual inspection of the chip in question, as well as of things connected to it. You might get lucky and find that it's just a bad solder joint, or a bit of crud that's fallen on some data lines, or a capacitor that's leaked its conductive guts on some trace.
Thanks for the help! I'll post a followup once I've opened the case and had a look. Would and IBM Pcjr have these chips? i have an old one of those lying out in the garage :)

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