I installed 6gb of ram and only 2gb is usable

RikuTheMellon · Sep 14, 2015

I recently bought 6gb of corsair 800mhz ddr2 ram, i didnt know how much mhz my other ram card is but i turned it on and it didnt turn on so i took my old one out. Now i have 6gb of ram but when i go to properties in computer it says its only 3gb and 2gb is usable. Yes i did go to msconfig and turned minimum ram off but it still says only 2gb usable. Any help on that?

vesp3r · Sep 14, 2015

are you using x32bit windows? x32 version is limited and it wont let you use more than 3GB
If you have x64 windows then check the max capacity of your motherboard

Ironsounds · Sep 14, 2015

Hello... 1) Does your BIO's say 6 gb?
2) What chipset MB do you have?
3) What mix of stick sizes do you have?
4) How many memory slots does your MB have?
5) what Windows version are you using x86 or x64?

Roshen · Sep 14, 2015

On a x86 (32 bit) OS, you can use upto 3.7GB.
Answer is simple, cause of your old RAM, new one is rejected.
When you buy a RAM, consider these,

DDR: RAM Slot your mainboard has.
CAS Latency: Timing of your RAM. Install RAMMon Timing will be under "Timings @ Max Frequency (JEDEC)". Your new RAM's timing's first number must be listed under "CAS Latancies Supported". Otherwise it will be rejected.
MHz: A value your mainboard can handle. If your new RAM's speed id lower than old's, Both RAMs will work on slow one's speed.
Maximum memory your mainboard and processor can handle.

RikuTheMellon · Sep 14, 2015

vesp3r :

Its 32bit thanks for telling me!

RikuTheMellon · Sep 14, 2015

Ironsounds :

1) i dont know what BIO is
2) im not sure what chipset i have
3) all of my ram sticks are the same corsair ddr2 800mhz 2x2gb and 2x1gb
4) i have 4 ddr2 slots and 2 ddr3 slots
5) i have a 32bit system at the moment

vesp3r · Sep 14, 2015

Then your problem is solved. Once you install x64 windows it should automatically detect your full ram and use it

vesp3r · Sep 14, 2015

RikuTheMellon :

lets just clear this up for you since you will eventually need to know this.
Its BIOS not BIO. It means Basic Input/Output System id its what your computer loads before the windows. Usually you can access it by pressing del or f2 (it displays the correct button for a second while loading (i do not recommend doing anything in there if you dont know what you are doing
What IronSounds wanted to tell you is that you need to match up your ram sticks in order to get optimal speed. If your computer support dual channel ram it is way better if you have (to say) 2x 2GB 800MHz ram than 1x 4GB 800MHz
Additionally you can install CPUZ and see most of the info you need

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I installed 6gb of ram and only 2gb is usable

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