Do I have 8GB or 16GB? Conflicting info

Flybye

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jun 29, 2006
Messages
371
So I have, what some may call "vintage", an EVGA Z68 with an i3770k and 4 sticks of 4GB Corsair Vengeance running 64 bit Windows 7 Pro SP1 and latest updates.

Where does it show I have 8GB of ram?
In my BIOS
My Computer properties
Task Manager
CMD Line systeminfo | findstr /C:"Total Physical Memory" shows 8,159 MB

Where does it show I have 16GB of ram?
CPU-Z (shows memory size 16GB and states each slot populated)
3DMark 11 (Test results show I have 16GB)
Speccy shows RAM 16GB

Any clues what could be causing the conflct? I am not sure it even matters since some programs can recognize the 16GB. Ive tried swapping out all 4 sticks between different slots and have loaded BIOS defaults but still the same thing.
 
Last edited:
They're both correct. You have 16GB installed but Windows only recognizes and will allow program to acces only 8GB for some reason. Which version of Windows do you have?
 
What os are you running? According to google Windows 7 home basic 64-bit can only use 8GB of ram, same for Vista 64 basic.
 
Oops I had almost forgotten all the versions of Windows 7. I am definitely on Pro, and I just updated my post. I am almost certain it showed 16GB at some point in windows.
 
I had this issue. Believe it or not re seating the ram fixed the issue.

Bios could see it all, windows saw half. Some programs saw it all some saw half. It was weird.
 
My friend had a similar issue with an old i7 870 I sold him almost 10 years ago. A few months ago he decided to install some more ram, added 2 more 4GB sticks to up to 16GB.
BIOS showed 8GB installed, Windows showed 16GB installed and 8GB usable.
I remoted into his machine and verified it showed 16GB installed and 8GB usable, I then went into one of the msconfig settings to check to see if there was a Ram limit set and there wasn't.

I had him bring me the machine and I as I was playing with it, I noticed that one ram stick was not all the way seated, it was just barely sticking up on one corner.
Powered down the machine, pressed on the stick and it clicked, fired up the machine, BIOS now showed 16GB installed, and Windows showed 16GB installed and usable.

I read that you moved your sticks around so it's probably not the same thing, but perhaps one of the slots is damaged and causing your issue.
maybe dust in one slot keeping the pins from contacting?
 
Yeah Ive moved all the sticks between different slots already. Im going to have to test each one individually, take the sticks out and dust out really well the slots and hope for the best.
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_presence_detect

All 4 of your modules have a working SPD (a small identification ROM), but the memory itself is not working for some reason. Hence the conflicting info.
I have to agree with Luke. I have seen this last year on a system where a memory stick that was not fully seated bios saw 8 windows may or may not have recognized 16gig. Ended up letting the PSU drain, uninstall all sticks and reinstalled and suddenly all was working again. Was strange.
 
If you have a rubber eraser, you could try cleaning the memory contacts with those.

I've revived old core2 machines not booting by cleaning the contacts. Granted, your machine isn't showing the same problems nor is it anywhere near as old, but it's probably worth a shot if you have no clue what's wrong and is easy to do.

Try reseating the memory first, though
 
So here is what Ive tried:
1. Swapped around all 4 4GB sticks
2. Left only 2 sticks and installed them in slot 1 and 3 then 2 and 4 to see if any of the slots are bad
3. Did the same with the 2nd pair of sticks
4. Disconnected power all night
BIOS keeps showing max 8GB no matter what. All sticks in any slot boot up into Windows with no trouble. Only having 2 x 4GB sticks installed showed 8GB as expected. CPUZ correctly shows unpopulated slots.

I left the rig disconnected from power all night, tried again this morning and all 4 4GB dimms still only shows as total 8GB. I installed 2 x 8GB sticks that were only recognized as 4GB sticks. So it still only shows 8GB with 2 x 8GB installed. Interesting thing is these 8GB sticks were properly recognized as 8GB sticks a few years ago.

I removed the cmos battery this morning so lets see what happens in the afternoon. Battery shows a solid 3.17v. Is it possible the memory controller on the CPU is shot?
 
Last edited:
Yep I had checked that, too. No limit set. Keep in mind its also showing this oddness in the BIOS.
 
So here is what Ive tried:
1. Swapped around all 4 4GB sticks
2. Left only 2 sticks and installed them in slot 1 and 3 then 2 and 4 to see if any of the slots are bad
3. Did the same with the 2nd pair of sticks
4. Disconnected power all night
BIOS keeps showing max 8GB no matter what. All sticks in any slot boot up into Windows with no trouble. Only having 2 x 4GB sticks installed showed 8GB as expected. CPUZ correctly shows unpopulated slots.

I left the rig disconnected from power all night, tried again this morning and all 4 4GB dimms still only shows as total 8GB. I installed 2 x 8GB sticks that were only recognized as 4GB sticks. So it still only shows 8GB with 2 x 8GB installed. Interesting thing is these 8GB sticks were properly recognized as 8GB sticks a few years ago.

I removed the cmos battery this morning so lets see what happens in the afternoon. Battery shows a solid 3.17v. Is it possible the memory controller on the CPU is shot?

Doubtful. The problem is more likely at a board or individual DIMM level.
 
oof, yeah somehow got it in my head that the BIOS was seeing all the RAM.

CPU memory controller probably has problems. If I remember right, Ivy Bridge didn't like running ram over 1.5v for long. What's your RAM voltage?
 
oof, yeah somehow got it in my head that the BIOS was seeing all the RAM.

CPU memory controller probably has problems. If I remember right, Ivy Bridge didn't like running ram over 1.5v for long. What's your RAM voltage?

As I said, that's highly unlikely. I've worked on literally thousands of computers over the years and I have probably only encountered about a dozen processors or so that have genuinely failed by themselves. Most CPU's I've seen that were bad were fried along with a motherboard. They do not generally go tits up on their own. I don't think I've ever seen one with a flaky IMC that exhibited problems anywhere close to this. In cases like this, it has been a motherboard and or memory modules each time. Secondly, you made a statement about Ivy Bridge not wanting to run RAM over 1.5v. The way your statement is worded it seems like this is the basis of why you have concluded that the CPU's memory controller is bad. Then you ask what the memory voltage is. This doesn't make sense as 1.65v RAM was common back in the day. I've never seen that cause issues either.
 
As I said, that's highly unlikely. I've worked on literally thousands of computers over the years and I have probably only encountered about a dozen processors or so that have genuinely failed by themselves. Most CPU's I've seen that were bad were fried along with a motherboard. They do not generally go tits up on their own. I don't think I've ever seen one with a flaky IMC that exhibited problems anywhere close to this. In cases like this, it has been a motherboard and or memory modules each time. Secondly, you made a statement about Ivy Bridge not wanting to run RAM over 1.5v. The way your statement is worded it seems like this is the basis of why you have concluded that the CPU's memory controller is bad. Then you ask what the memory voltage is. This doesn't make sense as 1.65v RAM was common back in the day. I've never seen that cause issues either.

Because he's tried 6 sticks of RAM in all four slots in varying combinations. If it was a motherboard issue, then why would all the sticks work in all the slots? Why would the 2x8GB sticks only have half their capacity recognized regardless of which slot they were in? Didn't mean to say the IMC was probably bad, but rather that it was possibly bad given what he's tried to do. Best bet is to drop it into another motherboard and see what happens.

Maybe it wasn't Ivy bridge, but I do remember some Intel CPU had IMC issues with DDR3 running at 1.65V.

That said, I too have never seen an CPU go bad without something else causing it... but that doesn't mean I automatically rule it out then there is a problem related to it.
 
Because he's tried 6 sticks of RAM in all four slots in varying combinations. If it was a motherboard issue, then why would all the sticks work in all the slots? Why would the 2x8GB sticks only have half their capacity recognized regardless of which slot they were in? Didn't mean to say the IMC was probably bad, but rather that it was possibly bad given what he's tried to do. Best bet is to drop it into another motherboard and see what happens.

Maybe it wasn't Ivy bridge, but I do remember some Intel CPU had IMC issues with DDR3 running at 1.65V.

That said, I too have never seen an CPU go bad without something else causing it... but that doesn't mean I automatically rule it out then there is a problem related to it.

It could easily be a VRM problem with the DIMM slots on the motherboard. It might work fine with two DIMMs populated, but might flake out when fully loaded. If the motherboard is the problem, then it wouldn't matter how many DIMMs the OP tries.
 
So the dimms are at 1.5v. They are an old 4 set of Corsair Vengeance 1600 sticks. I never bothered to try to overclock them. So they have stayed their whole life at 1.5v. The 2 extra sticks I tried are 2 x 4GB G.Skill Ripjaws also rated at 1.5v. I thought they were 8GB sticks before.

After 9 hours I put the CMOS battery back in hoping for a fresh new start. BIOS still only reading 8GB with my 4 4GB sticks, W7 reads 8GB, but CPUZ shows all ram spots populated with 4GB sticks and shows total ram 16GB. I got 2 x 8GB G.Skill and did get up to 16GB finally in BIOS and W7.

So about those original 4GB Corsair Vengeance sticks: I tried all 4 in another PC. A bunch of beeps and no boot up. I tried a pair at a time, and the PC started up. Then I tried all 4 again, and they worked! 16GB of ram on PC #2. I put them back into PC #1 and only see 8GB of ram. Weird.

This old EVGA Z68 FTW is having other odd issues now. I cant even overlock my 3770k anymore. For years I had it at a constant 4.7Ghz without turbo. Now putting the multiplier at 47 or anything less leaves the CPU at 3.8Ghz. No amount of tweaking anything can get this CPU past 3.8 now. Its been watercooled its whole life. Guess its almost time to upgrade. Once when I entered the BIOS it froze with only part of the BIOS screen loaded up. Yeaaah. Only happened once, though.
 
Check your memory. I just had a situation where the MB require x8 ram and one of the sticks was an x4. Replaced the x4 with an x8 and all was well.
 
Yeah they were all the same. The 4GB sticks all worked together for 5+ years. It just recently that only 8GB would be seen when all 4 are installed. But they also acted a bit odd in another computer. In the other pc all 4 would not boot up giving BIOS beeps. After taking them out and putting them back in they were able to boot.
 
It may seem weird but you may want to remove your cpu from the motherboard and then reinstall. I seem to remember back in the day that cpu coolers could just slightly warp the boards enough to cause issues like this, especially with memory. I still run my old 2600k and had the ram issue as well but recently relocated the rig into a new case and 16GB of ram started playing nice again. Good luck!
 
It may seem weird but you may want to remove your cpu from the motherboard and then reinstall. I seem to remember back in the day that cpu coolers could just slightly warp the boards enough to cause issues like this, especially with memory. I still run my old 2600k and had the ram issue as well but recently relocated the rig into a new case and 16GB of ram started playing nice again. Good luck!
That is VERY interesting! It almost makes me want to test that theory. Maybe after I try Rage 2.
 
Back
Top