Search
Sign in with
Sign up | Sign in

Win98 Not detecting correct RAM size! HELP

Tags:
Last response: in Memory
Share
Anonymous
Memory Expert

I posted this in the Software area but perhaps those of us here in the memory boards can help me too.

I've got a problem that I've been trying to solve for awhile now.
My sisters computer was just upgraded to 128MB of PC-100 Ram. Generic stuff, but she's not interested in gaming or anything like that, mosly internet and office applications, so it should be more than enough to do the trick.

Trouble is, as soon as I installed the stuff, things didn't seem to be going as well as they should for a system with 128MB of Ram.

Turns out Win98 will only detect 65MB worth!!
I've heard of this happening to other people as well. But so far the only way they've been able to correct that is to wipe the drive and reinstall Win98. That is NOT an option here.

Can anyone tell me how to get windows 98 to recognize the rest of the RAM??

System specs:

AMD K6-2 350
Soyo 5EHM Baby AT Super Socket 7 mainboard.
128MB PC-100 Generic RAM running fine at 8ns in "Turbo" mode.
Western Digital 3 GB hard drive. Ultra 33
Texas instruments Permedia 2 Graphics card (No worries folks, this will be upgraded soon. :)  )
Sound Blaster 16Pro
Zoom 33.6 Modem
Win98 2nd edition.

Thanks for any help in advance!

The Jolly Wizened Oaf!

More about : win98 detecting correct ram size

Register or log in to remove

More importantly what does yor bios detect on boot for Ram size? If it to only detects 65 meg then it is not a windows issue rather a bios/MOBO issue. Is this 1 128 meg chip or is it 2 64's? Some older boards have limitations as to SDRAM size and cannot accept 128 meg chips. Some dont even accept 64's. play with it a bit and try installing it in deferent slots, also, as always check for the latest bios for you mobo.
Anonymous
Memory Expert

Bios detects upon bootup and POSTing that there is 128MB of ram installed.
It's my old motherboard and I used to have 256MB of RAM in it on two sticks. In this instance, I am using a single 128MB Dimm. So, I know that age of the board is not the issue.

Thanks though!

The Jolly Wizened Oaf!
Anonymous
Memory Expert

Try looking on the Microsoft site , I was reading up an the limitation of Win 98 mem table and they have got fixes for all kinds of mem related problems there.

BTW if you have win98 don't install more than 512 mem it runs out of mem alloc space and hits the deck hard.......

M
Related ressources
Ask the community

well yu cna always try to reinstall windows as a last resort reformatting is preferable but not always neccesary If saving your info is a must I have reinstalled windows overitself before. I do highly suggest making a working copy of your hard drive first and experiment with that
Anonymous
Memory Expert

It is 768 that is the big hurt but if you have a 4x AGP port you can multiply the memory of your graphics card by 4 then add your system ram and you reach it pretty quickly..... Win98 sucks

M

one of the first UK T-Bird users....
Anonymous
Memory Expert

This also applies to W95. Microsoft offer three ways of dealing with it :

W95 : There is setup option to ignore > 512Mb or whatever
W98 : There is an msconfig option to ignore > 512Mb or whatever
Any : Take out the extra memory.

Thanks Bill.....

Easier to run dual boot W2K / W98 restricted mem for games, serious stuff on W2K.
Anonymous
Memory Expert

Well, I've tried reinstalling windows, but the system doesn't like that too much as it hangs. I've also checked the larger than 64MB OS size in the BIOS. It's going for greater than 64.

So, does anyone have any idea how to force windows to redetect everything it knows? I heard there was a way. Can anyone help? Or at least tell me where in the registry it keeps the memory size?

Thanks

The Jolly Wizened Oaf!

Are we talking 2 64 megs sticks here? Have you tried to run just one stick at a time. ie put oine stick in and see if you have any problems. Then do the same with the other stick as well. Perhaps the two sticks dont like working with each other. Is one ecc and the other not? Give that a shot to see if you indeed have a bad stick as well.

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

Sorry I screwed that last post up I see now it is one stick of 128. You sure you got it installed in the correct slot? ie dimm1 or dimm0 depending on the make of your motherboard.The only way to force windows to re-install everything is to first delelete everything in safe mode under device manager. I highly doubt this will fix your problem however. First I would suggest clearing your boards bios and running at bios default settings. to fix your system registry you need to boot to a command prompt only and type in scanreg/fix. It is sounding more and more like flaky ram to me though. do you have another SDRAM sitck to try temporarily to see if it does it with that stick as well? If not all leads back to the RAM and not windows.

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

The only thing I can think isn't very likely but it is simple to check.

Under the Start Menu.
1. click run
2. type MSINFO32 and press Enter
3. click on Tools
4. select "System Configuration Utility"
5. click on Advanced
6. see if "Memory Limited to" is checked. Un-check it if it is.
Anonymous
Memory Expert

To be honost with you, it indeed could be the RAM that's flakey. Even though it is new, that's no garuantee. Unfortunately I do have another stick right now to test the system. My computer is up at college and I won't be back down for another three weeks. Mayhaps I should take it with me and test it in my machine. If it's bad, then at least I could return it then.

The Jolly Wizened Oaf!
Register or log in to remove
 
Ask the community
Read discussions in other Memory categories
!