Vista - The Next Challenge: Vista x64 Crashes When Running With 4 Gig of RAM

Firstly, thanks for all of the help and assistance with the installation questions. Here's the next problem :

My system does not want to run with 4 gigs of RAM. Since upgrading to the 64 bit version of Vista, I have not been able to get it to run using more than 2 gigs. When the full 4 gigs are installed, it will stall during the load up process, or only operate for a few minutes before locking up, which will then need a manual restart/reboot.

Just to rule out the possibility of a bad stick of memory, I have swapped the four sticks out/around, ran the memory test, and everything comes out fine. However, when the full load of 4 gigs is installed, the same thing happens - system crash. I've also installed all of the latest drivers and BIOS, but this seems to have no effect either.

Now, I'm not sure if this is a Vista problem, motherboard/RAM incompatibility issue, or what? I have consulted the motherboard manual to see if I could learn anything about the situation, but it's mostly incomprehensible to my non-techie brain.

Any ideas regarding direction in solving this issue would be most appreciated.

Sorry, here's my stuff:

3 x Western Digital 500GB Caviar SE16 SATA II 300 7200rpm 16MB cache Hard Disk Drive in RAID 5 array
2 x OCZ 2GB Kit (2x1024) Gold Edition Memory DDR3 1066MHz PC3-8500 CL 7-7-7-21 Dual Channel Gold Layered XTC Heatspreader
XFX GeForce 8800 GTX 768MB DDR3 PCI-E Dual DVI
Asus motherboard P5E3 LGA775 Intel X38 DDR3 ATX
Intel CPU Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 95W Energy Efficient 2.4GHz

Have you installed SP1 yet?

Yes.

Well that rules Kb92977 out.

Is anything showing in your error logs?

Just spoted this on the OCZ forums:- ASUS P5E3 premium random freezing...solved? - OCZ Forum

It might be worth trying the settings mentioned and seeing if that helps.

Thanks, Zero! I will be checking that out later. Unfortunately it's now time to go to work.

Hi!

I have installed a total of 3 machines who all had similar problems, my last issue was solved by installing SP1 but there are other solutions as well:

Put the first stick in slot one and the second stick in slot three donig so enables dual channal. Now go in you BIOS and LOWER the frequency of your memory (As the some motherboards have diff frequencies they work on you should check what frequencies it support before changing them)

For example i changed mine from 800Mhz to 667Mhz and away were the bluescreens! This is caused if i translate it (correctly) due to the latency that the memory needs in order to enable dual channal.

Then by all means i should work. If by any chance your getting the famous "IRQL_IS_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL" Bsod the you should try and change the frequency even lower... it's a bit of experimenting but it worked for me.

Good luck!

Thanks for the tip, Shadowfly!

I'm at work at the moment, but that will give me something to try when I get home. I have managed to do a bit of research on the problem and it seems that it stems mostly from the motherboard. The OCZ site has plenty of info on the problem, but no direct answers for my exact specifications.

Anyway, at least we know that it isn't a Vista x64 problem.

If only the ASUS and OCZ forums were as helpful as you nice people here . . .