Upgrading 2GB DDR3 PC3L to 4GB PC3 on Lenovo Ideapad 100

Question

The Lenovo Ideapad 100 has one DDR3 1.5V slot. It shipped with the 2GB RAM chip shown in the photo (top), which you can see has the PC3L low voltage specification.

Old - top; new - bottom

I am attempting to replace it with the 4GB 2Rx8 PC3 chip shown (bottom). When I do this, the CPU powers up but the LCD display does not. When I replace the old chip, everything is fine again.

Is this likely to be a power issue (even though the DDR3 slot says it is 1.5V)? A BIOS issue? Or something else?

Thanks in advance!

Solution

The Lenovo IdeaPad 100 only supports 1.35v DDR3L memory.

1.5v memory is not compatible.

In future I would recommend using a compatibility checker such as that offered on Crucial's website:

http://uk.crucial.com/gbr/en/compatible-upgrade-for/Lenovo/ideapad-100-%2814-inch%29

Comments

[Angus]

Thank you! I will do so in future. Out of curiosity, though, why does it not support 1.5V? The slot on the motherboard says "1.5V" on it.

[qasdfdsaq]

@Angus: The memory controller is part of the processor, not the motherboard. The processor does not support 1.5v memory. The slot will be a generic slot that fits any type of memory (probably even fits DDR4)