BIOS/Windows sees 4gb out of 6gb

Status
Not open for further replies.
Update: Picked up the Corsair XMS3 6GB TR3X6G1600C9

Initially, when sticks went in, 4gb again. Then another cold boot, 6gb. Then every restart after that shows 6gb so far, without setting power/timings. Set the XMP profile. Tested the memory/system with Memtest, Occt, Prime95, 3dmark03, and Sisoftware Sandra. All results passed with no errors. This took about a full day and a half.

Then I tried to shutdown the computer and turned off the PSU. Waited a few minutes. Turned the PSU back on. And as soon as the light went on, on the mobo, I pressed the power button. And then upon boot, back to 4gb. Another cold boot would bring it back to 6gb.

So right now, it would seem like the situation is reversed.

With the OCZ golds, I would get 6gb sometimes on initial cold boots, with and without setting timings. And then restarts would ALWAYS show 4gb again. And of course, memtest saw 6gb but had errors.

With the Corsairs, I would now get 6gb about 70% of the time upon cold boots and once bios/windows sees 6gb, restarts always show 6gb. And when I turn off the PSU and then back on, then power on right after, it would be 4gb. But if I wait a few minutes first, after I've turned the PSU back on, then power on, 70% of the time it would be 6gb. Also, turning off the computer at night, then powering it on the next morning would show 4gb, but a second cold boot would bring it back to 6gb again.

So I tried setting the voltage. Dimm: 1.7 (from 1.65) QPI: 1.4 (from 1.35) I know Intel specs say anything more than 1.65 might damage the integrated memory controller, but I've seen people post much higher voltages than these. I hope that it would be fine. Tested this for about 10 hours. Cold boots, restarts, and turning on/off PSU would yield 6gb all the time, at least that I can remember. There's been so many tests. So basically at this point, I'm feeling pretty confident with the system.

Woke up this morning, boot up the computer, back to 4gb. Windows locked up. Another cold boot, and back to 6gb. Haven't tested it more after that yet. So right now, I'm guessing that the system is 'pretty' stable, except sometimes from cold boots it would have trouble powering the 6gbs maybe?

So a definite improvement with the Corsairs. At this point, with all the testing, should I still be thinking about changing any hardware? (Haven't changed the CPU or PSU) Is this occurrence which happens much less often now, normal/expected/tolerable? I assume I can increase the voltages more.

The RMA window is closing in. Thoughts and suggestions please. Thanks.
 
I believe that XP can only support 4GBs of RAM. I am checking on this now, because I know someone who had a similar issue. So it could be a software support issue and NOT a hardware issue.

OK so it sounds like an XP issue. 64-bit should support up to 128GBs of RAM. I am curious whether you have tried to update the Drivers, Firmware and or BIOS of your system. It could be that there is a software conflict between two pieces of software that is not allowing you truly recognize more than 4 GBs of RAM.
 
OK so it sounds like an XP issue. 64-bit should support up to 128GBs of RAM. I am curious whether you have tried to update the Drivers, Firmware and or BIOS of your system. It could be that there is a software conflict between two pieces of software that is not allowing you truly recognize more than 4 GBs of RAM.

I have updated the BIOS to the latest version. From my earlier post, currently I can get 6gb almost all the time, with the exception stated above.
 
Yes, most CPUs running Windows XP 32-Bit can only handle 4GB Ram.

64-Bit, can hold much more. If you have changed to 64-Bit and still having problems post back ill help you.
 
Yes, most CPUs running Windows XP 32-Bit can only handle 4GB Ram.

64-Bit, can hold much more. If you have changed to 64-Bit and still having problems post back ill help you.

I am already running on Windows XP 64bit.
 
Update: Picked up the Corsair XMS3 6GB TR3X6G1600C9

Initially, when sticks went in, 4gb again. Then another cold boot, 6gb. Then every restart after that shows 6gb so far, without setting power/timings. Set the XMP profile. Tested the memory/system with Memtest, Occt, Prime95, 3dmark03, and Sisoftware Sandra. All results passed with no errors. This took about a full day and a half.

Then I tried to shutdown the computer and turned off the PSU. Waited a few minutes. Turned the PSU back on. And as soon as the light went on, on the mobo, I pressed the power button. And then upon boot, back to 4gb. Another cold boot would bring it back to 6gb.

So right now, it would seem like the situation is reversed.

With the OCZ golds, I would get 6gb sometimes on initial cold boots, with and without setting timings. And then restarts would ALWAYS show 4gb again. And of course, memtest saw 6gb but had errors.

With the Corsairs, I would now get 6gb about 70% of the time upon cold boots and once bios/windows sees 6gb, restarts always show 6gb. And when I turn off the PSU and then back on, then power on right after, it would be 4gb. But if I wait a few minutes first, after I've turned the PSU back on, then power on, 70% of the time it would be 6gb. Also, turning off the computer at night, then powering it on the next morning would show 4gb, but a second cold boot would bring it back to 6gb again.

So I tried setting the voltage. Dimm: 1.7 (from 1.65) QPI: 1.4 (from 1.35) I know Intel specs say anything more than 1.65 might damage the integrated memory controller, but I've seen people post much higher voltages than these. I hope that it would be fine. Tested this for about 10 hours. Cold boots, restarts, and turning on/off PSU would yield 6gb all the time, at least that I can remember. There's been so many tests. So basically at this point, I'm feeling pretty confident with the system.

Woke up this morning, boot up the computer, back to 4gb. Windows locked up. Another cold boot, and back to 6gb. Haven't tested it more after that yet. So right now, I'm guessing that the system is 'pretty' stable, except sometimes from cold boots it would have trouble powering the 6gbs maybe?

So a definite improvement with the Corsairs. At this point, with all the testing, should I still be thinking about changing any hardware? (Haven't changed the CPU or PSU) Is this occurrence which happens much less often now, normal/expected/tolerable? I assume I can increase the voltages more.

The RMA window is closing in. Thoughts and suggestions please. Thanks.

RMA. Trust me.
I believe that XP can only support 4GBs of RAM. I am checking on this now, because I know someone who had a similar issue. So it could be a software support issue and NOT a hardware issue.

OK so it sounds like an XP issue. 64-bit should support up to 128GBs of RAM. I am curious whether you have tried to update the Drivers, Firmware and or BIOS of your system. It could be that there is a software conflict between two pieces of software that is not allowing you truly recognize more than 4 GBs of RAM.

Thats Software, not Hardware.
Yes, most CPUs running Windows XP 32-Bit can only handle 4GB Ram.

64-Bit, can hold much more. If you have changed to 64-Bit and still having problems post back ill help you.

Read the post before answering. Please.

RMA is the best choice, because the boards you are using are a NONO boards. Both boards are known to come as DOA or have issue recognizing RAMs.

Guess intel rushed it too much this time.
 
Update: I've RMAed the motherboard. Basically same issue as my previous post.

After changing to new rams, the 4gb/6gb issue only appeared from cold boots. So I increased the dimm and cpu vtt voltages. For the most part after the increase, 6gb is recognized from restarts and SOME cold boots. The mobo replacement had no improvement.

To try to fix the cold boot issue, I increased the dimm to 1.725 and cpu vtt to +300mv. This appeared to 'fix' the problem. To test this, I would wait 10-30 minutes in between cold boots, and as far as I can remember, the system would see all 6gb. So as long as the voltage levels don't damage my system in the long run, then I can live with these settings I suppose. BUT...

For cold boots that are farther apart, say turn off at night and turn on in the morning, my system would get to the logon screen and freeze, and then restart over and over. Another cold boot would stabilize the system again. When logged in, I get a message saying that my system could not recover the registry hive.

So at this point, having replaced the ram and the motherboard, this cold boot/freezing issue is either voltage settings or a CPU that seems to need alot more power to see all 6gb properly. And this would happen more likely when the time frame between cold boots are longer.

I really don't like setting the voltages that high, when I'm not even overclocking. But I've been told that some memory might require higher volts. Increasing the voltages seems to help the 4gb/6gb issue, and maybe increasing them even further might fix the 'cold boot 4gb/6gb' issue. But should I have to go that high for a system that is not overclocking and could that increase be the cause of the freezes/restarts.

Should I just rma the cpu?

Btw, for the voltage settings in the BIOS, EVGA has the increments color coded, gray, green and red. Are the greens the recommended levels? What do those colors mean?

Thanks.
 
Was just reading up on this mobo on the NewEgg forum and read that this board has some compatibility issues with certain power supplies. You may want to check to see if your ps is one that has issues. This could explain why upon increasing the voltage it seem to work slightly better.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom