I've just put another 1Gb of ram in my pc, in addition to the 512mb I had. There was a smell of burning and now there's nothing showing on my monitor. Have I burned something out? What might it be? Thanks.

Maybe maybe not but the problem is we have no clue what's the Manufacturer/Model of your PC. i_XpUser

Before you installed the memory, did you verify that the board could handle it and that it was the proper type? Kinda hard for us to know that since you didn't enter the Manufacturer information. www.crucial.com will show you exactly what is appropriate for your system. Life is more painless for those who are brainless.

Did you by any chance buy a diff type of ram other then DDR, like DDR2? Because if you did then that could be the reason for the burning. AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ OC 2.7ghz 4GB Dual Channel DDR 3200 Nvidia 7900GT SATA II 2x 300gig 7200rpm 16mb cache RAID-0+1 Gigabyte Nforce 4 SLI

Iam wondering if you would be able to install RAM that was not the proper type for your PC ,do they not protect this from happening by changing the amount of pins on differant type of RAM sticks ,for insstance I believe my SDRAM from my old PC had 168 pin RAM and my new PC DDR2 PC4200 RAM has 240 pin sticks ,unless you literly jam these sticks onto the M.B.(pushing to hard on the RAM stick when installing can crack the M.B.) With free online scans at web sites like Crucial etc .How can anyone try installing the wrong RAM ,a simple check with a web sites freeware scan and it will tell you what type of RAM your system uses ,or install the Bel-Arc advisor another freeware app via PC Magazine that tell you info on all of the hardware and software installed on your PC including installed updates and if they verify as being installed properly or not ! Again as previous replies have stated you must list the specs for your system in order for others to have some idea of what RAM you should have used and also list exactly what RAM you did install the RAM stick will have the specs written on the stick ! Good Luck Nick

There is one or more notches in the contact edge of the ram module that must line up with a bump or bumps in the bottom of the ram slot. If you inserted any ram module backwards so that the notch or notches did not line up with the bump or bumps, when you boot the computer the module that is backwards is instantly fried and produces smoke and a burnt smell, and some contacts in the ram slot are also instantly fried (or vaporized) and that ram slot can never be used again. If you clean up the carbon and sever any bridged contacts in the damaged slot, you may be able to get the mboard to work again, but you will not be able to install any ram in the damaged slot.

although ram is 'keyed' to make sure correct type is used and inserted around correct way, I can well believe some people will manage to do it wrong, like wedging the wrong type in half way and then switching on, especially if they are doing it with all the other bits (IDE cables etc) half obscuring the slots and without proper light (eg. torch - or as you say in USA: flashlight) to see properly.