Upgrading from 6gb to 12 gb of ram, trouble getting all recognized

RAD

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 12, 2009
Messages
489
Hi all,
I am hitting a problem with a ram upgrade for my computer. Recently I decided to upgrade from 6gb to 12 gb of ram. I went and ordered a second 6gb kit of the same make/model/manufacturer as my initial kit. After install of the new ram sticks and boot up, it recognizes the install but windows says only 6 of the 12 gb is usable.

I've checked to make sure all sticks of ram are snugly mounted, doesn't seem to be a problem there.

I am on win7 64bit ultimate, Gigabyte ud4p mobo on bios F13, i7 920 CPU. No overclock currently in place.

I've tried going to msconfig and resetting the max ram and it didn't help. I've been tinkering with bios settings to see if the problem is there but haven't had any success.

Any thoughts? The mobo and OS should support this change with no problems and I've never had a problem upgrading ram before so I am a bit confused.

Link to the ram: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231225

Some screenshots:




 
Not a Windows user, but it may help pin down the issue if you boot up any live CD of a Linux distro and see how much RAM the system reports. if you get 12 GB then you know it's a Windows issue. if you get 6, then ... good luck!
 
Sounds like a motherboard isses contact them(asus) gigabyte whoever and check for Bios updates as well Good Luck !
 
If Windows is seeing all 12GB, but says only 6 is useable, then something with windows is screwy.

What happens if you boot into safe mode?

How did you "reset" the maximum memory in msconfig? You should be able to just uncheck the box to make it be able to use all of it.
 
Re: mobo bios: I am on the most recent version (F13).
Re: msconfig memory reset: That is what I meant, unchecking the box and/or rechecking it (either way doesn't change anything after a reboot).
Re: Safe mode: nothing changes in safe mode (still says 6 of 12 usable)

New information: I booted up to old version of Memtest86+ I had sitting around and it is only recognizing 6 gb of ram (screenshot below).



Some reading I have been doing out there suggests you might have to bump the voltages in the bios to get 6 ram slots to be recognized by these old mobos but I am hesitant to do so without understanding what I am doing. Thoughts or advice?
 
Last edited:
This thread seems to be all over the place on the X58 and RAM issues:

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1546247&page=6

Somewhere in all that chaos was a suggestion to back off on the RAM clock. That might be fruitful.

I think I'd start with memtest and run 2 or 3 sticks at a time and make sure every module passes. If so, then go to booting all 6 and setting voltage and timings by hand.
 
Yeah, I've had it a few times where I was a bit too aggressive on my RAM clocks and it would only recognize one or two sticks. I got really impressive times on memtest, though. XD

Back off the clocks/frequency or increase the voltage a bit, see if that helps. If not, then try moving the ram to different slots, try the new ram by itself, etc. If it doesn't work by itself, it's probably bad RAM.
 
Send a mail to Gigabyte support and state your full motherboard model.
//Danne
 
Tried bumping the voltages and messing with the clocks, no changes. I will try to slot just the new ram sticks next and see what happens.
 
My old system which just got replaced was real sensitive to RAM in the second set of slots. I could run anything with just two dimms and overclock like crazy. But if I filled the other two slots I had to back off from the factory clock and underclock the RAM from 800 to 667 MHz. You may be in a similar situation here.

Edit: here's a thread on that board. Issue was not enough power by the mobo for all 4 modules. http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1656223
 
Running the new set of ram in place of the old set of ram (first set of slots), removing the old set of ram, lets the comp boot with no problems, all 6 gb recognized.

Trying to run ram in just the second set of ram slots leads to the computer not being able to boot.

Is my second set of ram slots on my mobo just bad?
 
I remember reading somewhere that some boards don't like to boot if you don't have a stick in the first slot. Can't remember where I read it, though.
 
Well 5 hours later and I've tested everything I could, messed with the voltages and timing as much as I feel safe doing, etc. My best guess is that there is something wrong with the motherboard interacting with my secondary set of ram slots. The ram behaves fine when plugged into the primary ram slots.

All ram sticks test out fine through memtest.

I am shipping the ram back to newegg (and eating a 15% restock fee, sigh). Will live with 6gb of ram for now and if I decide to revisit the upgrade I guess I will just buy 3 x 4gb sticks to slot into the ram slots that are willing to behave themselves.
 
I did try to run it at various configurations, all the way down to 1066.

I guess the hundred dollar question is: is my diagnosis correct (or close enough to correct), or is something else wrong with the set up. Or more directly: if I do go buy the 3 x 4 gb set up and slot those in (in place of the working 3 x 2 gb), will I still have problems or will that recognize and function at a full 12. According to the documentation for the mobo at least, it does support 4gb ram sticks.
 
Last edited:
If it were just a Windows issue, Memtest would have reported the full 12GB of RAM. It's not, so (imho) it has to either be a hardware or BIOS issue.
 
Well the extra 3x 2 6gb kit is on it's way back to newegg. I've got a 3 x 4gb kit on it's way to me. I will post back for the curious if that works to resolve the problem. There does seem to be quite a lot of chatter out there on these old first generation i7 mobos that they could be finicky about properly functioning with all 6 DIMMS, so I am hopeful that a 3 DIMM upgrade might work out better.
 
Well.. Maybe it is the CPU itself then since the memory controller is on-die.

Should work fine with the 3x4GB set.

I have a 3x4GB set running in my Gigabyte x58 UD3P board.
 
I dropped in the 3x4 gb set. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004CRSM4S

It seems to be getting along with the mobo/cpu much better than when I was trying to use all 6 DIMMS. However, even with this kit my "usable" is 11.5 of 12. Now, I am perfectly happy to leave well enough alone and not really concerned about squeezing that last .5 out, UNLESS that ram not being fully utilized is an indication of a deeper problem.

The system is stable and ram is testing clean under memtest, windows reports only 11.5 of 12 as usable regardless of whether I am using custom bios settings, xmp profiles, or the stock settings.

Should I just not worry about it and write it off as some quirk of my mobo/cpu or should that slightly less than full utilization be a cause for concern?
 
As an Amazon Associate, HardForum may earn from qualifying purchases.
That half a gig is being reserved by the system. It's nothing to worry about as it's normal Windows behavior.
 
Yeah, 500MB (more or less, depending on the chipsets/CPU) is often reserved for integrated components, NIC, graphics, etc.. Not a big deal. My APU can reserve up to 2GB for graphics, but I think Intel's integrated graphics can only reserve up to a max of 500MB--I'd have to check.
 
It is weird to me that it did not reserve anything when I was at 6 gb of ram, but does now that I am at 12. If something like that is normal though, I am not going to worry about it. Thanks for the information.
 
It could be that it still can't quite handle that much RAM, but I'm sure it's fine either way. If you want to be absolutely sure there's no issue, you could run memtest for a while (over night is usually good, since you're not using it and it'll give time for a few runs through).

If you run it over night and get no faults, you're probably golden. If you get a few faults that always occur at the same address(es), it could just be your firmware being funky, or it could be a bad stick. If you get moving faults, you may just need to increase the voltage or loosen the timings/clocks--could also be the memory controller being starved for voltage. If you get a flood of faults, you probably have your clocks/timings way too tight for the voltage available.
 
Last edited:
Did you re-seat the CPU?
When I was still fighting with trying to get the 6 DIMM upgrade to work I did, no bent pins that I saw or anything like that, everything seemed to be in good shape there. It didn't change anything though.
 
Try out a Linux live CD. See if it can utilize all 12GB. Right now I'm believing Windows is doing something dumb.
 
Any trouble i had getting all ram to recognize was just clock related. Dropping my FSB RAM ratio and manually setting the correct voltage were essential to get stable and have all sticks recognized.

Bummer that yours is being a little more finicky.

The support listed in the manuals for the x58 boards was based on what was actually available at the time for testing as far as I'm aware. That is, they didn't have 8GB sticks yet available on the market at the consumer level, so they weren't tested, but even those can work.

The i7-920 says it can address a max of 24 Gig of the right memory, but mine worked just fine with 48GB, before i switched to the Xeon.
 
Any trouble i had getting all ram to recognize was just clock related. Dropping my FSB RAM ratio and manually setting the correct voltage were essential to get stable and have all sticks recognized.

Bummer that yours is being a little more finicky.

The support listed in the manuals for the x58 boards was based on what was actually available at the time for testing as far as I'm aware. That is, they didn't have 8GB sticks yet available on the market at the consumer level, so they weren't tested, but even those can work.

The i7-920 says it can address a max of 24 Gig of the right memory, but mine worked just fine with 48GB, before i switched to the Xeon.

X58 was known to be a little flaky when it came to memory, especially populating all six DIMM slots. I ran into a similar issue with my MSI X58 motherboard. The OP's 3 x 4GB solution is probably the best bet, at least until he retires this platform.

It is not impossible to get six DIMMs populated or to even get 48GB working on an X58 motherboard, but it is also certainly not a guarantee for everyone that still has one of these motherboards. Even some of our LGA 1366 Xeon-based servers at work (single and dual-CPU) started acting up when we started populating all of the DIMM slots. That whole generation of hardware seems to have had its quirks.
 
I've had issues before with RAM upgrades where, even though I order the same Brand/Make/Model, the newer DIMMs are not identical to the older DIMMs - usually it's that they switch suppliers on the RAM chips, or the supplier changed the manufacturing process and it's not the exact same chip (if they aren't under a spreader, you would be able to see the markings on the chips themselves to verify), and even though it's specced to the same voltage/timings, they just don't play well together.

I've always upgraded RAM with complete replacement kits, since it's sometimes problematic. Sometimes you get lucky, but Murphy seems to win out with me.

FWIW - my X58 is running 6x2G with no similar issues, and has for years, but that was all purchased and installed at the same time. I can't overclock them at all (and that becomes an issue when overclocking the CPU, I have to downclock the RAM then). It has very finicky timing settings and are not very forgiving at all. I only have one other x58 rig and it's running on one set of DIMMs and no overclock, so I can't say if that one had flakiness or not.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top