Topic: A Question of RAM

[foxman318]

Installed 2 x 1GB RAM chips into my PC:
# 128M x 64
# PC2100 266Mhz
# Non Parity
# CL 2.5
# Non ECC
# 184 Pin
# Unbuffered
Booted up PC..........
PC identifies new RAM in the BIOS and boots up as far as the XP splash screen.
Then the screen blanks out....I do get the impression that the operating system has loaded but unable to see desktop.
Tried rebooting several times.
Tried safe mode but the list stops at the AGP graphics card driver and reboots itself back to normal mode and then screen goes blank again at the splash screen.
Re-inserted old RAM.......PC works again!!!

My PC Spec below:
Emachine 590
IMG845G Motherboard (2GB of RAM max)
2.4GHz Pentium 4 Processor
2 x 512 MB RAM Chips (184-pin 2.5v DIMM - 200/266 MHz Non-ECC Unbuffered DDR SDRAM)
GeForce 4MX 440 SE (nVidia 64Mb AGP) Graphics Card
Windows XP Home Edition ? SP2

Any ideas would be most welcome.
TIA.........Foxman

[Sandra]

Have you tried each 1gb stick individually to see if it works ok on both  

[Dack]

Going into your bios and changing the AGP aperture size to 128M (or 256M), booting and then changing it back to what it was before might be worth a try.

[foxman318]

Tried a single stick, no joy - same problem.

How do you change the AGP aperture setting??  My BIOS setup doesn't appear to have that facility. Only a change from PCI to AGP.

Have I missed something??  Looking at my PC Spec against the RAM Spec - there shouldn't be a problem.
This may sound daft and a bit newbie but if you insert 2GB of RAM into your motherboard, what amount of extended RAM should you be seeing in your BIOS??

Fox

[foxman318]

Just tried installing the new RAM again.  
Interesting point........the BIOS is showing 31232KB of extended memory whether I have a 1GB stick in or 2.
My Older RAM shows 1047040KB of extended memory when 2 x 512KB sticks are installed. It doesn't take the brains of an Arch Bishop to know that the BIOS is incorrectly reading the installed 2GB RAM.  But why??
The next setting down in the BIOS mentions 'Extended System Configuration Data (ESCD)area' for non pnp devices.  Selecting "yes" clears this area. Would this setting help me or is the RAM still the problem.

Fox......

[Sandra]

It sounds as if the make of ram is incompatable with your mobo.
I had that problem a year or so back with two different makes of 256 and 512 sticks of SDRAM only being read as 128 and 256 respectively in one make of mobo and not at all in another. That problem was solved by geting a refund from the shop that I bought them from and buying some more for a fiver or so more from Crucial, they gurantee theirs to work if you go through the match the ram to the mobo procedure on their site.
I havent come across that problem with DDR though as that seems to work with any mobo  

[foxman318]

Reckon ur right Sandra...
Looks like a refund coming on.........and RAM from elswhere.

Fox