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Thread ID: 81082 2007-07-15 10:42:00 New Additional Ram shione83 (7126) Press F1
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569265 2007-07-15 10:42:00 hi guys,
would anyone have any ideas on this...
i added more ram to my pc which now gives me 992Mbs (have no idea what has happened to rest of it as i had 512Mb and added 512mb) but that aside now my pc is running at the same speed as it was and at times is even slower :(
programs are telling me that i have insufficient memory and stop running.
before i added the additional ram i had 512mb as 2x 256mb the additional ram is 1 x 512mb.
the 2 original sticks of ram were placed with an empty memory slot between them... i put them next to each other and the new one at back? or front? of them and pc went haywire, so replaced them as they were and placed new ram in the middle of them which sorted out pc.
now its just the speed thing that is driving me nuts :(

running xp, athlon 2600+.... 2 x 80gig hdd.
an explanation would be helpful :)
thanx
shione83 (7126)
569266 2007-07-15 11:42:00 firstly if your system supports dual channel putting in a 3rd RAM chip will make it drop back to single channel mode effectively halving the memory bandwidth, although sometimes more RAM is more important than the speed. For dual channel mode you need pairs of RAM chips - preferably all matched.

Next how full is your hard drive? sometimes memory errors are because there's not enough room left for the swap file, also if the hard drive is full the system will crawl.

Finally more details - what operating system, what programs are giving the error etc.

RAM size for most people works about like this under XP
256 - slow as buggery
512 - much better, memory hungry programs still slow
1024 -better, most programs run ok, enough for a lot of people
2048 - slightly better, enough for almost anyone
more than 2048 - usually can't tell the difference

for Vista you can add about another 256 - 512 to each step
dugimodo (138)
569267 2007-07-15 12:01:00 Its telling you that its got 992MB only cos 32MB has gone to graphics. ronyville (10611)
569268 2007-07-16 02:11:00 Thanx ronyville for that info on where the rest of my ram was

Dugimodo... how do i find out if my system supports dual channel mode??

my c drive had 57.8 gigs free space and my D drive has 61.2 gigs free. i have deleted history and cookies and run defrag.

i am running xp home edition
athlon 2600+
think the system is Nividea as this name was under system manufacturer in system information... was that what u wanted to know?
Programs giving me the out of memory messages is PhotoImpact (photo editing software)...
and paintshop pro they have never done that before
also i notice that when i am on any web page that the page or screen will roll slightly but then rights itself...this too has started since i added the extra ram.

wish dick smith staff had explained this all to me before selling me the ram!!
shione83 (7126)
569269 2007-07-16 02:17:00 Dugimodo... how do i find out if my system supports dual channel mode??

You'll have to find out what the mobo brand/model is.

Mobos with 2 or 4 ram slots usually support dual channel.

How many ram slots on the mobo?
Speedy Gonzales (78)
569270 2007-07-16 02:25:00 Athlon xp 2600+ is not dual channel ram aware, thats why you have 3 ram slots!.... SolMiester (139)
569271 2007-07-16 03:51:00 You have to be careful about what kind of RAM you use as some motherboards have specific requirements when filling 3 slots. It's best to read your motherboard manual and find out exactly what it will take. FoxyMX (5)
569272 2007-07-16 03:52:00 You have to be careful about what kind of RAM you use as some motherboards have specific requirements when filling 3 slots. It's best to read your motherboard manual and find out exactly what it will take.

Agreed - it's cheaper than trial and error :lol:
wratterus (105)
569273 2007-07-16 04:17:00 Can you tell us what model motherboard you got? ronyville (10611)
569274 2007-07-16 04:53:00 Athlon xp 2600+ is not dual channel ram aware, thats why you have 3 ram slots!....

It's a MB thing, not dependant on CPU. Many AMD dual channel MB had 3 slots, 1 for 1 chan and 2 for the other. You could run a 512 and 2x 256 in dual mode.
PaulD (232)
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