[ILUG] [Q] is it possible for memory _slot_ to fail?

[Brian Foster]

 c.10 days ago I came home, found the main breaker tripped,
 and subsequently discovered the dishwasher's pump had failed
 and the power supply on my computer was fried.  I presume the
 pump's failure was the initial event (it'd been making weird
 noises).  I haven't done anything about the pump yet, but
 yesterday replaced the power supply.

 however, when I powered up the machine, all I got was 3 long
 beeps.  nothing else (in particular, nothing on the display).
 half-guessing and half-remembering beeps like that mean the
 BIOS is very unhappy, and a typical cause is memory, I pulled
 one of the two 256MiB PC133 DIMMs.  by chance, I pulled the
 right one, the machine came up (sort of, more on this later).

 ah, Ok, I lost a DIMM.  no big deal.  back to the shop, bought
 a replacement, inserted it, and 3 long beeps again.  eh?
 I presume it unlikely I bought a bad/wrong DIMM, and so now
 wonder if the slot / socket / associated circuity / whatever
 might have been damaged (fried?)?  assuming I didn't damage
 something when I pulled the original DIMM, is such a thing
 possible?

 I realize I could play swap DIMMs with the other socket (I
 only have two slots) and work out whether or not the DIMMs
 that caused beeps really are bad or not, but I'm reluctant
 to do that, and I've more serious problems anyway ....

 the BIOS/CMOS isn't holding the settings anymore for hdb,
 which whilst the Slave is actually my main HDD, and the
 one nominally booted.  that is, the settings are no longer
 programmed in, and when I reprogram, they vanish on the
 next reset.  I can force hdb to boot by manually probing
 it with the BIOS, but that's a PITA.  any suggestions?
 (both HDD drives (ATA), hda and hdb, seem to be fine.)

 and both the DVD-rewriter and CD-rewriter aren't responding,
 (e.g, when I press the open button, nothing happens, and
 neither was detected by Linux when booting).  this is a bit
 weird, as I checked when when I installed the power supply
 that they flashed their lights.  now they don't appear to
 be powered.  since they are on the same Y-cable for power,
 I'm going to guess, ATM, I just knocked the Y-cable loose
 whilst playing with the DIMMs (physically possible), but
 this problem has me even more annoyed than the hdb problem,
 since it means I've no backup drives!

 grumble ....   anyways, the main question again:  is it
 possible to loose a DIMM memory _slot_ when a power supply
 fries?  is there anything I should look for when I open up
 the case (mainly to investigate the DVD/CD problem)?

cheers!?
	-blf-

-- 
Experienced (20+ yrs) kernel/software Eng: | Brian Foster   Montpellier,
 • Unix, embedded, &tc;  • Linux;  • doc;  | blf at utvinternet.ie   FRANCE
 • IDL, automated testing, process, &tc.   |  Stop E$$o (ExxonMobile)!
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