New RAM

[Cobracon]

I've just installed some new RAM in preparation for upgrading my CPU next month. My "old" set-up was as follows:

Gigabyte: GA-P35-DS3R rev2.0 motherboard
Intel E2160 (1.8GHz & 800MHz FSB) dual core CPU
Corsair XMS2 PC 6400 DDR2 800 RAM (2 x 1GB)
XFX GeForce 7300GS ver2.2 videocard (I'm not a gamer)

The CPU has been overclocked to 3.06GHz, and the System Memory Multiplier has to be set to 2.5, thereby forcing the RAM frequency to run @ 850MHz. The auto setting would not boot because the RAM frequency would try to match the FSB speed otherwise, which is now 1360MHz with the overclock. The computer has been running this way for over 2 months with no stability problems. CPU-Z, Look In My PC, and Belarc all recognized/reported the "old" RAM correctly as 1024MB in slots A0 & A2, for a total of 2048MB.

New RAM:
Corsair XMS2 PC 8500 DDR2 1066 (2 x 1GB)

The system wouldn't boot with System Memory Multiplier set to auto, so I set it to 3.2 (???) so the RAM frequency runs at 1088MHz, and it booted with no problem.

Here's the rub. Belarc and Look In My PC now report only 512MB RAM in each slot, but Belarc reports a Total installed as: 2048MB, and Look In My PC reports the Total installed as: 1024MB with 1610MB free. CPU-Z is a little different. Under the 'SPD' tab it recognizes the new RAM as PC 6400 (400MHz) and the Timings table shows 533MHz. 'Memory' tab reports 2048MB installed. 'CPU' tab shows Core speed: 3060MHz, Bus speed: 340MHz, and Rated FSB: 1360MHz.

Why isn't the new memory showing up correctly in some areas of the various analyzing/reporting programs?? The numbers just don't add up even within some programs. For what it's worth, I plan to upgrade to an Intel e6750 CPU next month.

[D.8080]

I've read, on Tom's hardware I think, about odd memory and fsb multipliers that won't work correctly in certain setups.

Eg with 1333 fsb you can't use 3/5 mem divider, and alike.


Chipset limitation, you should check intel website.

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Don't answer with a signature quotation, mercy!

[Cobracon]

I emailed Gigabyte before purchasing the RAM, told them what and how I was running the computer, and they told me all would be well as far as support/compatability with the PC 8500 RAM and motherboard.

Windows reports 2GB of memory, RAM timings are 5-5-5-18, and the computer performs flawlessly, as usual. This could just be my habit of splitting hairs, but I was still concerned over misreporting of the different RAM parameters by various software.

Let me take this time to "wave my hand" at you and Italy. FWiW, my mother's father was born on the island of Sicily, moved to Salerno, then immigrated to the US at age 9. I had the fortune of spending 12 days touring Italy in 1975, and fit right in because I look like the people in southern Italy and NOT like a tourist.

[D.8080]

We aren't so far away in a way...

Sicily is beautiful, has a lot to show, and a baroque you'd forget not that fast.

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Probably the programs do not have parameters to report exactly speeds and other things, but eventually the ram just works (like it should). My guess, and my half cent at this point.

Hail!

[Cobracon]

The latest revision to CPU-Z detects the new RAM correctly, and then some. So basically the old program wasn't configured to read the parameters displayed by DDR 8500 RAM, which is pretty much what you guessed, dume.

Thanks............