What It Takes to Break a RAM with ESD (feat. Linus Tech Tips)

Great video(s)... BUT! There's a lot of ways a stick of RAM can be broken/damaged aside from not POST-ing (passing the Power On Self Test).. when I worked in tech support, we would sometimes run Memtest for 24 hours before we declared it "stable" as it would sometimes seem stable at first, but still show data corruption after multiple passes. The fact that it boots, doesn't mean it won't currupt data, or maybe fail in a month or 2 under stress 🙃

Roel Binnendijk

Indeed, but this is the key: You are HIGHLY unlikely to cause so much damage that the system fails its Power-On Self-Test (POST). I work with servers and can assure you, the results of ESD that you _cannot_ see or feel does cause errors that will show up in tests. Use Memtest86 (or Memtest86+, your choice) if your hardware vendor didn't specify their own test suite. Not long ago we had reason to replace all of the DIMMs in a certain (small) group of systems, and the customer's team didn't follow ESD-safe practices on the first set. Note that's "small" in enterprise terms, each server had 48 DIMMs and there were not a few systems involved... Nearly every DIMM they installed in that first round was giving errors within a week. That was all DIMMs in, oh, a dozen servers? By the next outage window we had educated them, and not a single replacement after that failed. So TL;DR - Don't assume it's OK just because it didn't let out the magic smoke. The PC turning on means squat. Not all hardware is made the same. When the lithography shrinks and the operating voltage is lowered that's your clue that it's more sensitive than the prior generation.

Thats one of the best videos I've ever seen xD keep up with the cross-overs, there are so many people who are going to like them!

I always keep a small bag of dirt in my pocket, so I am always grounded. :-P

As a long time sys admin, I have never fried any hardware like this. Maybe a system builder would have more "experience" with ESD taking out hardware. I still wear the strap because... one dead part is one too many. If I don't wear the strap, I touch the chassis before touching anything.

I once fried a CMOS just touching a computer case

Private for me too. :(

What the heck?!? I was watching this video less than 30 minutes ago with no problem and SUDDENLY it's been marked 'private' and now I can only see the version from the LTT channel, even though it's not listed there. This is weird! Please let me know if you had to mark this as private since LTT hasn't made it public on his channel (or something like that).

Mark G

That was fun. Newer hardware certainly appears to withstand ESD. About 15 years ago, I killed a PCI Ethernet adapter by dusting it with a feather duster. It was only when the PC refused to boot until I removed it that I realised my mistake. Luckily I never tried dusting the inside of a PC with one!

Seán Byrne

I think the protection got better with the years, find a functional 386 computer, just look at the RAM the wrong way and see if it's still stable…

Thomas Eriksen

two powerful guys!

Rebecca

It's quite surreal seeing Linus and Mehdi making a video together.

I think you guys should have actually run a memory test to check if the memory was fully functionnal. Granted that would have taken a long time.

Now I know why Linus had so much fun!

Phakorn Sripayak

Excellent video, but the only component I killed because of ESD was a CPU, maybe a part 2? :p

lululombard

This video was great fun to watch! Congratulations on finally killing the RAM. Could you have attached the ground clip to a data pin and then use your charged body to touch any other pin on the module?

HA!! This was great fun to watch. Both of you are certifiably crazy! :)

I guess grounding it was a (intentional?) mistake. There are TVS diodes all over the memory stick. They need ground connection to be effective.

Przemysław Brojewski

Don't know if this is true or not, but I have heard that ESD can set up a chip for a potential failure in the future. So you may in some sense be shortening their life even if you aren't outright killing them.

Rich Rector

2nd :) Oh, If there are capacitors on the pins they will block the DC. The shortest path to ground will stop the charge from traveling the circuit. You are simply arcing to ground:)

Two tech nerds and a high voltage esd gun .. what could go wrong? .. stay safe my friends.

Peter Stevens