Can Damaged RAM cause random slowdowns?

All my browser are running painful slow, its not a ISP or connection issue.
Opening a youtube video for example, can most likely crash Firefox or Chrome.
If i have Skype open, and then try to open Chrome for example, sometimes it opens normally, but sometimes it runs so slow to the point the whole pc stops responding.

The same doesnt occur when i run hardware consuming games. However alt+tabbing a game to open a browser may take more than 5 minutes.
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About 2 months ago, i had 2 memory modules (2GB 667mhz kingstom).
One day every single app stopped working and after a memtest, i found that
one module was damaged and therefore, useless. i removed it and stayed with the other one.

While i know 2gb of ram isnt much, it should be enough to run decently skype + a youtube video
on chrome or firefox. but doing so, can cause extremely slowdowns sometimes (sometimes it works perfectly).

I Switched from my x64 windows 7 to a x32 windows xp because i though it was w7 consuming too much memory, but the problem remains.

So my doubt is: while one module is complety broken, the other could be damaged and causing slowdowns? I ran a memtest for about 2 hours and no problems were found on it,
but it could be possibly running slower than it can?

 

Although very rare, I've seen it happen. The caveat is that, in addition to system slowdowns, you'll normally run into random startup issues and blue screens of death as well.

I would download both Advanced System Care and Malware Bytes to check for registry errors, disk defrag and malware. If these don't make a difference, it could be a hard drive issue.

Hope this helps.

 

Hi my friend , you must run memtest86 5 hours at least because 7th pass is the most important , even what is the specifications of your system ? You can follow this

http://majorgeeks.com/download4181.html

Go to

from the left side you must opt for
menu
Summary ( wait 30 seconds until report is generated )
you have to select
Report from bar menu
from sub menu
Quick Report
Plain Text
opting for
Desktop as saving location

follow this

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=86880

attaching the report :wave

 

I've already ran multiple malware scans recommended me by the malware removal subforum, and since they found nothing, this doesnt seem to be the problem.

Is the windows Disk verification is enough to detect a HardDrive issue? if so, then HD is not the problem either.

also i will see if i can find a friend with a DDR2 module (seems like everybody using DDR3 only by now) to do some testing.

EDIT:
thanks for the answer falcon, i will do the memtest all over the night and post the results here

as for my Computer specs, they are:
Core2Quad 2,3ghz
2GB 667mhz CL2 kingstom
ATI 4850 1GB
Samsung HD322HJ 320gb

 

You can verify hdd issue with

Start
Right click to My Computer
Properties
Tools
Error-checking opting for Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors Check Now

even you can download this utility

http://www.majorgeeks.com/Hard_Disk_Sentinel_d7520.html

informing us the status of your hdd :wave

 

I've seen this sort of thing twice, first time was on a desktop running ME about 10 years ago. The second time was on a Compaq laptop a few years later.
When I ran memtest on the desktop I noticed it ran really slowly at times, transferring the memory into another machine confirmed the memory was at fault.
On the laptop it turned out to be something wrong with the motherboard, but in both cases no test I ran said anything was wrong.