Robert Redelmeier wrote:
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.chips Robert Myers wrote in part:
Never occurred to me that they would size the power supply
to the actual sale. That means that, even if you pay
outrageous prices for a subsequent OEM add-on, it might
not work. I'd call that deceptive marketing.

It might well be. Perhaps this was a batch of computers
specifically built for some megacorp refresh but which proved
out to have a high defect rate -- either as RAM installation
or PSU quality. It was subsequently rejected and dumped on
the resale market where you bought it cheaply.

They ought to have been sold as "debranded", but perhaps
someone was asleep at bigOEM. Or a disobedient reseller.

Not a reseller. Direct purchase from the OEM.

Your thought that my deal might have been the result of a messed up
corporate order would explain some weird things. For example, why would
anyone put two 2Gb memory sticks in a three-channel box to begin with?

The boxes don't make much sense for a big corporate purchase, but maybe
they weren't the right boxes to begin with. The order was for a more
normal corporate machine with 4Gb of memory and a core 2 dual processor.
4Gb was stuck into the wrong boxes and the boxes were tested before
someone said oops. Test the memory, tell your guys to stick it into the
boxes and offer a special deal. Who knows. The extra stick of memory
seems obviously to have been stuck in. Someone who knew to skip slot 1
would also know to skip slot 3.

Robert.