4GB of ram showing as 704MB

joe_21 · 08-08-2008, 06:52 AM

Hey there ..
I recently have had a problem wherre my 4Gb of ram shows up as 704mb in system and it preforms likek it aswell . Also this happens when i startup my computer and my monitor doesnt come on until the login screen , meaning i cant enter the bios .

I have jsut bought a new 4870 and installed it with a new PSU ... could that be anything , i also jsut got a new SATA drive ...and monitor ... the ram is a few months old

Most times it goes to 704 but soemtimes it works properly and goes to 4GB

I have tried my brothers ram and it does teh same thing .. i am thinking the MOtherboard ..

Any help would be greatly appreciated

**vladimirb** · 08-08-2008, 07:48 AM

Hello joe_21 and welcome to TSF...
How much RAM can you see in BIOS???
Would be nice to post full system specifications...
How many DIMM slots you have for RAM???
Clean sticks with rubber and DIMM slots with brush...
Maybe your system is corrupted...

joe_21 · 08-08-2008, 05:19 PM

my specs are
Intel Core2Duo E6300 ( was a 3.2 now at 1.8 )
4GB of Kingston 800mhz ram
GA-965P-S3 motherboard
ASUS VW222U monitor
ASUS P150 Case
HIS 4870

The was overclocekd for a little but it has been turned back

I dont thnik it would be the monitor as even the i can see the bios scrren at startup , when i go control panel , system it shows 704MB , right now its showing 3.50GB ?? so yeah occaionally it will show 3.50 but most times it shows 704MB

i have 4 slots , with 2 2GB sticks in , I cant actually see the bios ...... only occasionally when it loads with the full 4GB and then i can see 40784 or something like that .

**vladimirb** · 08-09-2008, 02:10 AM

Put sticks in other two DIMM slots and check if it will vary from 704MB to 3,5GB...
And would be nice to test memory with memtest86+...
You can download it here:
http://www.memtest.org/

joe_21 · 08-09-2008, 03:53 AM

yeah i have switched the sticks around , tried one stick and tried my brothers ram ,i dont think its teh ram

Also it always shows 4GB of ram when i switch of my computer for say1 hour or so ... but if i say restart it will always go with 704 , could it be something with the PSU ?

**vladimirb** · 08-09-2008, 04:59 AM

I could suggest you to remove CMOS battery with PC turned off...
Leave it this way for about 1-2 minutes and hit power button couple of times...
Put back CMOS battery...
Start PC...
Check whats your RAM value...

joe_21 · 08-09-2008, 05:12 AM

Ram value from the POST screen ? if it shows the post scrren it will always be 4xxxx and if i cant see the post screen the PC will shows 704MB in system . I updated my BIOS , wouldn't that basically do the same as resetting the CMOS .. or not >?

**vladimirb** · 08-09-2008, 05:23 AM

When you reset BIOS you are turning back to default value...
If you made some changes, when you reset BIOS, you will reset system time, date, boot options etc...

joe_21 · 08-09-2008, 05:36 AM

so is removing teh C-mos doing a different job than resettign the BIOS

**vladimirb** · 08-09-2008, 05:43 AM

You reset BIOS when you remove CMOS battery and put it back...

joe_21 · 08-09-2008, 07:16 AM

ah well , ive been in to the BIOS and loaded optimized defaults .. and updated the BIOS .. so i dont think its th eBIOS ...... any oher ideas ? ;)

joe_21 · 08-09-2008, 08:00 PM

Could it have anything to do with WIndows ... ? i just installed a clean version of windows . that when the problem sstarted ., and that was the same time when i got my new Video Card and another SATA drive ..... could these hav eanythign to do with it ?

joe_21 · 08-10-2008, 01:20 AM

Um i just Ran msinfo32 . and it gave me this

OS Name Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Version 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3 Build 2600
OS Manufacturer Microsoft Corporation
System Name JOE
System Manufacturer Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
System Model 965P-S3
System Type X86-based PC
Processor x86 Family 6 Model 15 Stepping 6 GenuineIntel ~1866 Mhz
BIOS Version/Date Award Software International, Inc. F13, 17/07/2008
SMBIOS Version 2.4
Windows Directory C:\WINDOWS
System Directory C:\WINDOWS\system32
Boot Device \Device\HarddiskVolume1
Locale United States
Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "5.1.2600.5512 (xpsp.080413-2111)"
User Name JOE\Joseph
Time Zone Tasmania Standard Time
Total Physical Memory 4,096.00 MB
Available Physical Memory 234.92 MB
Total Virtual Memory 2.00 GB
Available Virtual Memory 1.96 GB
Page File Space 2.65 GB
Page File C:\pagefile.sys

There it says i have 4GB physical memory , which is right but teh PAGR file space is 2.65 GB is that the problem .. can you see any problems there ... system is still reading 704 MB

Houndog777 · 08-10-2008, 08:36 PM

Hi, Joe
Just thought I'd add something here as I currently have 4GB of RAM at 800Mhz on WinXP too.
This is what my System shows:-
Total Physical Memory 4,096.00 MB
Available Physical Memory 2.72 GB
Total Virtual Memory 2.00 GB
Available Virtual Memory 1.96 GB
Page File Space 5.09 GB

You mentioned Overclocking earlier. "The was overclocekd for a little but it has been turned back"

What did you overclock; CPU? Memory? or Both?
To what extent did you overclock?
And why did you "turn it back"?

joe_21 · 08-10-2008, 10:23 PM

Um they both were overclocked ,,,... but not for that long .... so the only difference is basically our Available Physical memory , I think it is a software problem ? what do you think ? i jsut installed WIndows a few days agao and that was when the Problems started

Houndog777 · 08-11-2008, 03:07 AM

Joe,
You need to help us, in order for us to help you.

In what way did you overclock the CPU & RAM?
I ask this because I know that if something works only with a voltage of 1.8v for example, and you give it a much higher voltage, then there is a very good chance that damage will occur. Even if it is only for a second.

We need to know all the details of what happened before these problems began, in order for us to figure out what the root of the problem is.

So, how exactly did you overclock the CPU & RAM? Did you up the Voltages?
And why did you stop overclocking?
Is it because your computer reacted badly to the overclocking?

garettrules · 08-11-2008, 03:20 AM

Also try running this online scan http://crucial.com/systemscanner/index.aspx and see whats max ram you can hold you might only be able to hold 1-2gs ram and are the drivers installing correctly? try doing windows update and see if there anything try updateing your gcard to

**vladimirb** · 08-11-2008, 03:41 AM

Go START > RUN... > type DXDIAG
tell us how much RAM memory you have???

joe_21 · 08-11-2008, 08:39 PM

Im at schoole right now , i never touched the voltages, so that should be fine ,,,,,,, someone else told em to reinsnatll windows , so i will try that , if that doesnt work , i will try the memory test ..

joe_21 · 08-12-2008, 01:00 AM

It wasnt a software problem .... i just installed Vista and well its half installed , after its installed it said restarting computer , and it did now teh screen wotn come on again , i have tried it with another screen and trh graphics card is not giving out a display .

So it could be either one of these things ( Because these things are all new , and were all installed at time when this started to happen )

PSU 560w Silverstone
HIS ATI 4870 512MB
GA-965p-S3 ( this wasnt just installed , but this could well be the problem )

And could it be the CPU ?

08-08-2008, 06:52 AM	#1 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	4GB of ram showing as 704MB Hey there .. I recently have had a problem wherre my 4Gb of ram shows up as 704mb in system and it preforms likek it aswell . Also this happens when i startup my computer and my monitor doesnt come on until the login screen , meaning i cant enter the bios . I have jsut bought a new 4870 and installed it with a new PSU ... could that be anything , i also jsut got a new SATA drive ...and monitor ... the ram is a few months old Most times it goes to 704 but soemtimes it works properly and goes to 4GB I have tried my brothers ram and it does teh same thing .. i am thinking the MOtherboard .. Any help would be greatly appreciated

08-08-2008, 07:48 AM	#2 (permalink)
vladimirb Mentor Hardware Team Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Banja Luka, Serb Republic Posts: 3,692 OS: xp pro sp3, Server 2003, Windows 7 Professional x64bit My System	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Hello joe_21 and welcome to TSF... How much RAM can you see in BIOS??? Would be nice to post full system specifications... How many DIMM slots you have for RAM??? Clean sticks with rubber and DIMM slots with brush... Maybe your system is corrupted... __________________ MCP - MCSA Cisco SMB Account Manager

08-08-2008, 05:19 PM	#3 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB my specs are Intel Core2Duo E6300 ( was a 3.2 now at 1.8 ) 4GB of Kingston 800mhz ram GA-965P-S3 motherboard ASUS VW222U monitor ASUS P150 Case HIS 4870 The was overclocekd for a little but it has been turned back I dont thnik it would be the monitor as even the i can see the bios scrren at startup , when i go control panel , system it shows 704MB , right now its showing 3.50GB ?? so yeah occaionally it will show 3.50 but most times it shows 704MB i have 4 slots , with 2 2GB sticks in , I cant actually see the bios ...... only occasionally when it loads with the full 4GB and then i can see 40784 or something like that .

08-09-2008, 02:10 AM	#4 (permalink)
vladimirb Mentor Hardware Team Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Banja Luka, Serb Republic Posts: 3,692 OS: xp pro sp3, Server 2003, Windows 7 Professional x64bit My System	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Put sticks in other two DIMM slots and check if it will vary from 704MB to 3,5GB... And would be nice to test memory with memtest86+... You can download it here: http://www.memtest.org/ __________________ MCP - MCSA Cisco SMB Account Manager Last edited by vladimirb; 08-09-2008 at 02:12 AM.

08-09-2008, 03:53 AM	#5 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB yeah i have switched the sticks around , tried one stick and tried my brothers ram ,i dont think its teh ram Also it always shows 4GB of ram when i switch of my computer for say1 hour or so ... but if i say restart it will always go with 704 , could it be something with the PSU ?

08-09-2008, 04:59 AM	#6 (permalink)
vladimirb Mentor Hardware Team Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Banja Luka, Serb Republic Posts: 3,692 OS: xp pro sp3, Server 2003, Windows 7 Professional x64bit My System	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB I could suggest you to remove CMOS battery with PC turned off... Leave it this way for about 1-2 minutes and hit power button couple of times... Put back CMOS battery... Start PC... Check whats your RAM value... __________________ MCP - MCSA Cisco SMB Account Manager

08-09-2008, 05:12 AM	#7 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Ram value from the POST screen ? if it shows the post scrren it will always be 4xxxx and if i cant see the post screen the PC will shows 704MB in system . I updated my BIOS , wouldn't that basically do the same as resetting the CMOS .. or not >?

08-09-2008, 05:23 AM	#8 (permalink)
vladimirb Mentor Hardware Team Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Banja Luka, Serb Republic Posts: 3,692 OS: xp pro sp3, Server 2003, Windows 7 Professional x64bit My System	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB When you reset BIOS you are turning back to default value... If you made some changes, when you reset BIOS, you will reset system time, date, boot options etc... __________________ MCP - MCSA Cisco SMB Account Manager

08-09-2008, 05:36 AM	#9 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB so is removing teh C-mos doing a different job than resettign the BIOS

08-09-2008, 05:43 AM	#10 (permalink)
vladimirb Mentor Hardware Team Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Banja Luka, Serb Republic Posts: 3,692 OS: xp pro sp3, Server 2003, Windows 7 Professional x64bit My System	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB You reset BIOS when you remove CMOS battery and put it back... __________________ MCP - MCSA Cisco SMB Account Manager

08-09-2008, 07:16 AM	#11 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB ah well , ive been in to the BIOS and loaded optimized defaults .. and updated the BIOS .. so i dont think its th eBIOS ...... any oher ideas ? ;)

08-09-2008, 08:00 PM	#12 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Could it have anything to do with WIndows ... ? i just installed a clean version of windows . that when the problem sstarted ., and that was the same time when i got my new Video Card and another SATA drive ..... could these hav eanythign to do with it ?

08-10-2008, 01:20 AM	#13 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Um i just Ran msinfo32 . and it gave me this OS Name Microsoft Windows XP Professional Version 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3 Build 2600 OS Manufacturer Microsoft Corporation System Name JOE System Manufacturer Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd. System Model 965P-S3 System Type X86-based PC Processor x86 Family 6 Model 15 Stepping 6 GenuineIntel ~1866 Mhz BIOS Version/Date Award Software International, Inc. F13, 17/07/2008 SMBIOS Version 2.4 Windows Directory C:\WINDOWS System Directory C:\WINDOWS\system32 Boot Device \Device\HarddiskVolume1 Locale United States Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "5.1.2600.5512 (xpsp.080413-2111)" User Name JOE\Joseph Time Zone Tasmania Standard Time Total Physical Memory 4,096.00 MB Available Physical Memory 234.92 MB Total Virtual Memory 2.00 GB Available Virtual Memory 1.96 GB Page File Space 2.65 GB Page File C:\pagefile.sys There it says i have 4GB physical memory , which is right but teh PAGR file space is 2.65 GB is that the problem .. can you see any problems there ... system is still reading 704 MB

08-10-2008, 08:36 PM	#14 (permalink)
Houndog777 Registered User Join Date: May 2007 Location: Scotland, UK Posts: 2,683 OS: XPpro sp3 My System	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Hi, Joe Just thought I'd add something here as I currently have 4GB of RAM at 800Mhz on WinXP too. This is what my System shows:- Total Physical Memory 4,096.00 MB Available Physical Memory 2.72 GB Total Virtual Memory 2.00 GB Available Virtual Memory 1.96 GB Page File Space 5.09 GB You mentioned Overclocking earlier. "The was overclocekd for a little but it has been turned back" What did you overclock; CPU? Memory? or Both? To what extent did you overclock? And why did you "turn it back"? Last edited by Houndog777; 08-10-2008 at 08:38 PM. Reason: Typo

08-10-2008, 10:23 PM	#15 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Um they both were overclocked ,,,... but not for that long .... so the only difference is basically our Available Physical memory , I think it is a software problem ? what do you think ? i jsut installed WIndows a few days agao and that was when the Problems started

08-11-2008, 03:07 AM	#16 (permalink)
Houndog777 Registered User Join Date: May 2007 Location: Scotland, UK Posts: 2,683 OS: XPpro sp3 My System	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Joe, You need to help us, in order for us to help you. In what way did you overclock the CPU & RAM? I ask this because I know that if something works only with a voltage of 1.8v for example, and you give it a much higher voltage, then there is a very good chance that damage will occur. Even if it is only for a second. We need to know all the details of what happened before these problems began, in order for us to figure out what the root of the problem is. So, how exactly did you overclock the CPU & RAM? Did you up the Voltages? And why did you stop overclocking? Is it because your computer reacted badly to the overclocking?

08-11-2008, 03:20 AM	#17 (permalink)
garettrules Registered User Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: Regina Posts: 94 OS: Vista home premium, Xp service pack 1-3	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Also try running this online scan http://crucial.com/systemscanner/index.aspx and see whats max ram you can hold you might only be able to hold 1-2gs ram and are the drivers installing correctly? try doing windows update and see if there anything try updateing your gcard to

08-11-2008, 03:41 AM	#18 (permalink)
vladimirb Mentor Hardware Team Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Banja Luka, Serb Republic Posts: 3,692 OS: xp pro sp3, Server 2003, Windows 7 Professional x64bit My System	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Go START > RUN... > type DXDIAG tell us how much RAM memory you have??? __________________ MCP - MCSA Cisco SMB Account Manager

08-11-2008, 08:39 PM	#19 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB Im at schoole right now , i never touched the voltages, so that should be fine ,,,,,,, someone else told em to reinsnatll windows , so i will try that , if that doesnt work , i will try the memory test ..

08-12-2008, 01:00 AM	#20 (permalink)
joe_21 Registered User Join Date: Aug 2008 Posts: 11 OS: Xp SP2	Re: 4GB of ram showing as 704MB It wasnt a software problem .... i just installed Vista and well its half installed , after its installed it said restarting computer , and it did now teh screen wotn come on again , i have tried it with another screen and trh graphics card is not giving out a display . So it could be either one of these things ( Because these things are all new , and were all installed at time when this started to happen ) PSU 560w Silverstone HIS ATI 4870 512MB GA-965p-S3 ( this wasnt just installed , but this could well be the problem ) And could it be the CPU ?