2

Score

Avatar
Richdave
6.6k

Asked

System does not recognise 4G RAM

History

I have an HP elitebook 6930p running XP pro.

It came with 2G installed RAM and I have now installed another 2G module - exactly the same as the original one.

CPUZ says I have 4G installed RAM, the BIOS says I have 4G installed but system properties says 2.96G

Any ideas?

Block Image

Edited by: Richdave ( )

When you acquired this laptop did it only have 1 2gb stick of ram in it? In your BIOS: What do you have your video memory set for? Do you have any shadowing, buffering or caches?

ABCellars,

Post Answer

5

Score

Avatar
ABCellars
13.7k

Answered

Accepted Answer

Permalink • History

Dave that 2.96GB is what the operating system is reporting it can access, system memory That is not the value of what is installed on the computer. Almost never is the system memory equivilent to the actual amount of memory installed on a computer/laptop. Go to start, all programs, accessories, system tools, system information. Under system summery you should find the value that XP knows is installed next to "Total Physical Memory". If the total physical memory there is reported other than 4GB I would run Memtest on it's extensive test to see if all of your memory is good and/or pull both memory sticks to verify you actually have 2, 2GB sticks installed. If all that comes back clean you have a problem with your Northbridge.

Thanks ABC - I should be a little embarrassed to have confused system memory with Physical RAM! The system is showing 4G physical RAM under system information.

Richdave,

Thank you richdave for accepting my answer. Here is a link to a good explanation as to how and why this happens: http://www.dansdata.com/askdan00015.htm I think you and rj713 will find it a good read.

ABCellars,

+ Great Answer.

Majesty,

2

Score

Avatar
rj713
39.1k

Answered

Permalink • History

The problem is you are running 32bit XP Pro. XP will only recognize 3GB of ram. To utilize all your ram you need to update to Windows 7 or switch to 64 bit XP.

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/269155...

Edited by: rj713 ( )

rj713 the people in that tomshardware thread are wrong. Windows XP 32 bit can address almost 4GB of memory. 32-bit means that the CPU/operating system uses a 32-bit memory address (in binary) so that means it addresses memory from (00000000000000000000000000000000) to (11111111111111111111111111111111) giving it a possible 4,294,967,295 values. That means it can address roughly 4 GB. This roughly 4GB of addressable memory includes the video memory. Usually though only 3.5 - 3.9 GB is seen by the operating system as usable memory due to the memory being allocated to other things by the system such as shadowing, buffering, caches and video. ___Also see___ http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/......

ABCellars,

32-bit Windows 7 is no different in what it can access or address than 32-bit XP. To address/access more memory you need to go to a 64-bit op sys, flavor doesn't matter.

ABCellars,

Here is a link to Crucial memory for the OP's computer. Please note what the company states about how much ram will be seen. This is what I go by--I know there are procedures you can take to modify things but they are generally nor recommended. http://www.crucial.com/store/listparts.a...

rj713,

Add Your Answer