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Ram running at wrong speed?

2956 Views 12 Replies 4 Participants Last post by  mdeko, 
C
I just upgraded my Dell Dimension 2400 to 2x512 sticks pc3200 ram. pc3200 is supposed to run at 400mhz and yet my bios is telling me that my ram is running at 266mhz. What's going on? Is there something that my ram is connected to that is only running at 266mhz thus limiting the speed of my ram?

The reason i upgraded is because when i'm playing music and i open another application my music starts to skip. I know it's not spyware because i've done bazillions of tests and they are all clean and i run multiple scans each night. Plus, my computer has alwasy been like this, even when i first got it. I just defragged my harddrives too so i doubt that is the problem. Anybody have any idea?
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M
it could be the fact that your MOBO is too much older to support the 400mhz RAM, (either that or the shop who upgrtaded you scammed you!! - which i doubt)


wait to see what other people reply but it may be (as a last resort) try upgrading (flashing )your bios, (note if you get the wrong version you computer is knackered, which is irreversible)
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C
Well i upgraded it myself and although i didn't buy the dell ram that dell lists on their site, i got the same kind. they list 512mb pc3200 sticks as compatable with my computer. It'd be pretty nasty of them to list them as compatible, (because they are) but they won't run at their full speed. Then again, i wouldn't put it past dell...
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M
wait and see what others reply, (and as a last resort) flash your bios, this could solver your problems,

maybe dell support can point you in the direction of a COMPATABLE bios update, (if you get the wrong one you are screwed)
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J
Go here. According to this it takes a maximum 1gig of pc2700 ram. Check your bios settings too as sometimes the bus speed needs to be adjusted manually on some mb's. Dell have been known to lock bios settings as well, in some cases. You would need to consult them if this is so to obtain their assistance in unlocking the bios. Speaks volumes for building your own, huh?

Jon
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M
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/dim2400/en/sm_en/specs.htm?c=us&l=en&cs=&s=gen

System clock 400- or 533-MHz data rate

Memory type PC2100 (266-MHz) or PC2700 (333-MHz) DDR SDRAM (non-ECC)

Derived from quad pumping 100MHz and 133MHz

The fastest the ram actually runs is 133MHz on your system (4x133 ~533MHz)

It cannot run at 400MHz on your system simply because your system does not use a 200MHz bus speed


Everything looks normal...
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C
Ok, all that is fine. The max is pc2700 but even that can run at 333mhz but mine is only running at 266mhz. I'm talking to dell now, I'll let you know how it turns out. Thanks!
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C
Well dell basically had me upgrade my bios which did nothing. Here's the new development though: I downloaded a program which monitors how much free memory my computer has and it basically hovers around 60%. When i open iTunes, i have about 55%. So i'm playing a song in iTunes with 55% free, then i open firefox. Well now i still have 54% free but my music starts getting choppy. I'm beginning to think that my computer slow down isn't ram related at all. I think it might be my hard drive access time. Here is my hard drive setup:

I have 2 hard drives
C: - 40 gigs
D: - 250 gigs

on C i have multiple partitions, since i have 2 distributions of linux and swap space.
On D i have ~120gigs of movies and maybe 10 gigs of music.

I did just defrag both of these drives. But, could that be causing the problem? I had these choppy problems even before i got all my movies and stuff though. Oh, and most of my programs are on my D drive too. Is this a bad setup?
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M
i iamgine you used window to defrag? if yes download diskeeper, (search google) it is free for 30 days, defrag both. but i have a feeling it could be caused either by your processor not being up to scratch, you sound card, or the speed of your harddrive, (try playing music from a cd, if it isn't choppy then i would sya your hardrives are slow, (ie 4000rpm)
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C
I know my hard drives are 7200rpm. How much effect does the sound card have because all i have is whatever came integrated on my mobo.
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M
depends, if it is starting to become corrupt, it will slow the system down, you can pick up good pci sound cards for around £30,

but also ensure the drives are defragged using diskkeeper,

and also try playing a cd rom, if that is choppy, as i said it is either your harddrives or you media player,

you couls also download a new version of media player from microsoft, (even though you probbily have v10 already, reinstall it.
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C
I downloaded diskeeper and i defragged my C drive. I set my D drive to defragment at night. When i woke up this morning though, diskeeper said it hadn't run because DISKCHK was secheduled to run first. So i restarted my computer to let it run and as soon as it started i got the...blue screen saying there was an error. (i don't remember exactly what it was since i'm at work now.) But it said that i should remove any newly added hardware and try again. The only new hardware i can think of is my printer which i just plugged in (which i'm having a toooon of problems with) and maybe that new ram i just put in.
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M
could be, but before you remove anything, just try rebooting, and see if error come up, if it doesnt, do it again it will be a windows problem (not to worry about
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