I'm running a dual boot comp ...WXP and W7 recently added). With XP, I had 4G DDR3 at 1600, no problems. Using an i5-2500k at 4.4G on a Gigabyte p67 mobo, with no problems. Because of the new W7, I doubled the ram to 8G. I now have 4 x 2G. I tried booting into XP, but it keeps blue screening. I know XP only uses 3.5G ram. Does 8G in XP make it choke? Removed the 2 added sticks and all is fine. The ram is
#3. "RE: computer choking on too much ram?" In response to lenjack (Reply # 2) Mon Jul-23-12 02:12 PM by MSU
Have you tried removing the original RAM and using just the new RAM in those slots? Have you tried the original RAM by itself in the other slots?
edit: It could be the new RAM is bad, the slots could be bad, the controller could be flaky. As has been noted XP 32bit shouldn't choke on the extra RAM, just not recognize it.
#5. "RE: computer choking on too much ram?" In response to MSU (Reply # 3) Tue Jul-24-12 04:56 AM by Chickenman
Quote:
QUOTE: edit: It could be the new RAM is bad, the slots could be bad, the controller could be flaky. As has been noted XP 32bit shouldn't choke on the extra RAM, just not recognize it.
I remember reading some articles that stated that while XP 32 bit would work on 4gb ( normally only recognizing 3.5gb )...more than 4gb started conflicting with memory allocation area's and would cause a BSOD.
You could enter memory configuration variables in the Config.sys Boot.ini to move the memory allocation areas to a different level, thus avoiding the conflict in a dual boot scenario. I think it was the AGP or PCI-E memory locations that caused the conflict with more than 4gb of memory.
#9. "RE: computer choking on too much ram?" In response to Bob G (Reply # 7)
An actual boot into XP is going to be a little more responsive than running it in a VM. But not very noticeable for most tasks. And the 3D gaming that John mentioned would be pretty much nonexistent. However that would certainly alleviate the extra RAM problem if it's indeed XP that is the problem and not a flaky slot or RAM. Which the more I'm thinking about it XP has to be the problem since Win7 is working fine. Although Win7 could for some reason be a little more forgiving with some flaky RAM, I doubt it. I'm running 32-bit XP in a VM under 64-bit Win 7 with 8GB of RAM with no issues.
#10. "RE: computer choking on too much ram?" In response to MSU (Reply # 9)
Just checked each stick individually. The 2 older ones are fine, but ONE of the new sticks is faulty. Will RMA with Newegg. Anyway, I would still like to here about the Config.sys situation mentioned previosly.
#11. "RE: computer choking on too much ram?" In response to lenjack (Reply # 10) Tue Jul-24-12 02:23 AM by MSU
Quote:
QUOTE:Anyway, I would still like to here about the Config.sys situation mentioned previosly.
Ah yes, I see where Chickenman mentioned that. However config.sys isn't used in Windows XP.
edit: Let me clarify that. There "is" a hidden config.sys file with nothing in it. It's there for older programs that need to write to it during installation. However even if something is written to it Windows XP doesn't use it.
#15. "RE: computer choking on too much ram?" In response to MSU (Reply # 11) Tue Jul-24-12 05:12 AM by Chickenman
Quote:
QUOTE:
Ah yes, I see where Chickenman mentioned that. However config.sys isn't used in Windows XP.
edit: Let me clarify that. There "is" a hidden config.sys file with nothing in it. It's there for older programs that need to write to it during installation. However even if something is written to it Windows XP doesn't use it.
Ahhh...it was the boot.ini, not config.sys that I was thinking about.
#12. "RE: computer choking on too much ram?" In response to MSU (Reply # 6)
Quote:
QUOTE: Hmm, that's possible. I could've sworn that it just wouldn't recognize it. It's been so long though that I may be mistaken.
Found one of the articles that explains XP 32 bit BSOD with more than 4 gb of Ram. As I recalled it is usually a conflict in address locations for video card memory.
However, by the time Windows XP SP2 was under development, client systems with more than 4GB were foreseeable, so the Windows team started broadly testing Windows XP on systems with more than 4GB of memory. Windows XP SP2 also enabled Physical Address Extensions (PAE) support by default on hardware that implements no-execute memory because its required for Data Execution Prevention (DEP), but that also enables support for more than 4GB of memory.
What they found was that many of the systems would crash, hang, or become unbootable because some device drivers, commonly those for video and audio devices that are found typically on clients but not servers, were not programmed to expect physical addresses larger than 4GB. As a result, the drivers truncated such addresses, resulting in memory corruptions and corruption side effects. Server systems commonly have more generic devices and with simpler and more stable drivers, and therefore hadn't generally surfaced these problems. The problematic client driver ecosystem led to the decision for client SKUs to ignore physical memory that resides above 4GB, even though they can theoretically address it.
Now I just have to find the articles on limiting or remapping the memory allocation areas.
#16. "RE: computer choking on too much ram?" In response to Chickenman (Reply # 12) Tue Jul-24-12 05:20 AM by Chickenman
Quote:
Now I just have to find the articles on limiting or remapping the memory allocation areas.
I think this is it. You have to use the: /noexecute=alwaysoff /nopae switch in the boot.ini to disable DEP and PAE. DEP enables PAE by default. Switching off DEP and PAE should ensure that any Ram memory above 4gb is not addressed.
Hardware-enforced DEP enables DEP for both kernel-mode and user-mode processes. It must be supported by the processor and the operating system.
Software-enforced DEP enables DEP only on user-mode processes. It must be supported by the operating system.
DEP is supported by Windows XP with SP2, Windows Server 2003 with SP1, Windows Vista, and later versions of Windows.
On 32-bit versions of Windows, hardware-enforced DEP requires PAE, which is supported by all Windows operating systems that support DEP. When DEP is enabled on a computer with a processor that supports hardware-enforced DEP, Windows automatically enables PAE and ignores the boot parameter values that disable it.
The parameter combinations for each Windows operating system are summarized in the following section.
Now that you mention it I don't see where he specifically states that Win7 worked with the extra RAM. I just assumed it did since he said that he was dual booting WinXP and Win7 but only mentioned XP crashing...
#21. "RE: computer choking on too much ram?" In response to MSU (Reply # 20)
You are right. I didn't try W7 with the 8G. I will be mostly using XP till I get the hang of W7, so it need to work in XP.I did try the suggestion to use the original 2 dticks with one of the new sticks, which confirmed tthat the stick I thought to be bad, was the bad guy.
