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Thread ID: 67487 2006-03-29 10:04:00 Problems After Fix tojira (10089) Press F1
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441719 2006-03-29 10:04:00 Hi, about a month ago, (I wouldn't say I'm an expert, very far from it, but I know generally how to install new hardware etc.), I stupidly broke our motherboard by forcing a stick of memory in backwards... but lets not go into that. Anyway we took it to a repair guy, who upgraded the motherboard for us along with the RAM which we were intending to upgrade in the first place.

Specs after upgrade and "fix" (that I know of):

- AMD Athlon 64 3200+
- 1.5Gb RAM (3 x 512Mb DDR400 PC3200)
- Albatron KM51 Series MoBo (onboard nVIDIA 6150 graphics which apparently uses 128Mb of memory or something)

Before:

- AMD Athlon XP 2500+
- 512Mb DDR400 PC3200 RAM
- ASROCK K7S41GX Mobo
- Sparkle 6600GT 128Mb AGP8x (annoying as the new MoBo is PCI-E so we will have to buy a new card)

Anyway we've had a few problems, one of which was that he had forgotten to plug in the DVD drive, but I quickly fixed that. Now the problems I am not so sure of...

Windows XP now starts up VERY slowly (stays at the "windows is starting up" screen for a good few minutes). I guess my best bet would be to reinstall XP? Or will I have to backup my files, format my drive and start afresh?

But my main concern is with the RAM. Although I have 1.5Gb of it stuck in, when I go to My Computer properties, it states I only have 896Mb (of which 128 are of course used for the crappy onboard graphics). So it seems to only be recognizing 2 of the sticks or something. I opened the computer and noticed they were stuck in dimms 1 3 and 4, I have no idea whether that matters or not, but I took out the stick in slot 4 and moved it to slot 2. Anyway, booted it up and still says we only have 896Mb memory. Any ideas?

Thanks, any help or suggestions are much appreciated :).

Kelsey
tojira (10089)
441720 2006-03-29 10:15:00 Look at the motherboard manual and see if the motherboard uses dual channel RAM. If it does, then only slot 1 and 3 are being detected, minus the 128 MB of video RAM being used which equals 896 MB of RAM.

You will need another matching 512 MB of RAM to run the board in full dual channel configuration. This will give you 2048 MB of RAM minus the 128 MB for the video.
Jen (38)
441721 2006-03-29 10:30:00 Look at the motherboard manual and see if the motherboard uses dual channel RAM. If it does, then only slot 1 and 3 are being detected, minus the 128 MB of video RAM being used which equals 896 MB of RAM.

You will need another matching 512 MB of RAM to run the board in full dual channel configuration. This will give you 2048 MB of RAM minus the 128 MB for the video.

Thanks for the reply, it says in the manual "Four DIMM sockets with Dual Channel Technology supported". I have in socket 1 and 2, "AData" sticks and in the 3rd socket "RamBo" (or something similar). Does this mean I will not be able to use the "RamBo" stick alongside the AData sticks (as you say they must match)? Do all the sticks have to be of the same brand? Is there any way to disable the dual channel? And if so would it have much of an effect on performance?

Thanks!
tojira (10089)
441722 2006-03-29 10:50:00 You should be able to run all three sticks in single channel mode, Though some motherboards do refuse all sorts of configurations, I'm trying to find the manual for your board, will post again when I have had a read.

As for slow boot, after a rebuild that extensive I would stop at nothing short of a format and reload, The rig must be in Driver Hell at the moment.
Metla (12)
441723 2006-03-29 11:05:00 hmmm....Seems the Albatron FTP server which hosts all their manual is down, Cant snafu a manual for any of their products. :badpc:

Can you advise which specific model of board you have?, they used the same model number for nforce 3 and nforce 4 boards (754/939).

www.albatron.com.tw
Metla (12)
441724 2006-03-29 11:16:00 hmmm . . . . Seems the Albatron FTP server which hosts all their manual is down, Cant snafu a manual for any of their products . :badpc:

Can you advise which specific model of board you have?, they used the same model number for nforce 3 and nforce 4 boards (754/939) .

. albatron . com . tw/english/it/mb/search . asp?keywords=KM51" target="_blank">www . albatron . com . tw

Hi, it's the "KM51PV" . Socket 939 and nforce 4 if that helps .

And the slowness - yeah I'll just have to format it I guess, thanks for clearing that up!
tojira (10089)
441725 2006-03-29 11:56:00 Albatron link works for me.

Trevor :)
Trev (427)
441726 2006-03-29 12:07:00 The link I posted works just fine, clicking on a specific model will take you too an overview page,clicking the "manual" link brings up a list of available languages, clicking the English choice initiates the download of a zip from via FTP, download fails to start.

I pinged her and recieved 100 percent packet loss.
Metla (12)
441727 2006-03-29 12:21:00 What was it in the manual you were looking for exactly? tojira (10089)
441728 2006-03-29 12:32:00 A chart/diagram showing which ram slots are to be used.

Any chance the ram stick itself was damaged when you tried to force it in backwards?
Metla (12)
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