No, I don't mean it's stolen...I mean it gets hot...really hot. Ok, here's the deal. I surplused some old machines at work and basically, old, dead machines and their components are up for grabs. I took out the RAM sticks and thought I might be able to ramp my old Micron up from 128 MB to 256. I had no real way of telling if any of the sticks would be compatible but figured the worse that could happen is that they wouldn't work.

I opened up the micron and tried the first stick. I noticed that one of the latches that holds the stick in place wasn't clicking in. At first I thought I didn't have the stick in right but after working with it, realized that the latch itself seemed broken. I thought as long as the RAM stick was firmly in place...so what.

I put in the first stick, got a beer error and didn't even get a video image. Ok. Incompatible. When I powered off the computer and took out the RAM stick, I noticed it was warm. Interesting I thought but I figured I'd must move on.

Put in the next stick. Periodic, loud, long beeps. This was definiately not working. Immediately powered off the machine. Then I smelled something burning and when I touched the RAM stick, it was actually hot. I touched the other stick that originally came with the machine and it was cool. I immediately stopped my operations. Now I don't know if the slot itself if just bad or if mismatched RAM can heat up and burn.

BTW, the computer runs now as it always has so there doesn't seem to have been an effect on it...just the RAM sticks I tried to add. The latch also failed to engage with the second stick. I checked and the size and configuration of the sticks are the same as what's already in the machine.

Has anyone come across such an issue before?

its an odd one mate
are you sure the memory types are identical?

the problem with memory is there are so many bloody types

what sort of system is the Micron? if you dont know the RAM type off hand i may be able to work it out from the system type

Putting incorrect ram in could indeed cause substantial heat increase due to it not being meant to take that kind of power (older memory slots pump out more memory than newer memory uses for instance)
cant see why the slot would be broken just because the catch doesnt work, but like you said the memory seems identical
give me a little bit more feedback
does the memory have anything printed on it?

Actually, the memory is a crap shoot (otherwise known as a "gamble"). Might or might not have been compatible. I didn't realize that even incompatible RAM sticks would react this way. I thought that worst case scenario...it just wouldn't be recognized or would just result in a memory error preventing boot.

Guess it just wasn't meant to be.