If you don’t want the background go to the bold bit at the bottom!!!

Please move if I'm totally in the wrong place!


A buddy has a Dell Inc. Dell XPS72 (This is a 32 bit system but i'm about to upgrade to 64bit), when I got to it and checked it's memory it has the following:
Slot 'DIMM_1' is Empty
Slot 'DIMM_3' has 256 MB (serial number 00005200)
Slot 'DIMM_2' is Empty
Slot 'DIMM_4' has 2048 MB (serial number 929AC451)



This really surprised me. A 265MB card? In the bios it said that it was at x16 speed as opposed to the other card being a x1 speed. I didn't really understand that.

So I went away and got matching 2GB ram
4GB kit (2x2GB) DDR2-1066 CL7 NonECC PC2-8500

Put it in, took out the 256MB, and it didn't boot. Didn't have time to fiddle about with it so I just put back in the 265mb and she booted. The BIOS and vista recognised everything, all good.....

I help this buddy one out remotely so I was back in yesterday because of some outlook config problem and I was surprised how slow the system was with all that memory. I know it won't see all 6.25 GB but it should at least see the 4gb, right?

In Windows Experience rating thing it shows the 6.25 gb, but in task manager it only has physical memory at ~2033 MB.
Shared System Memory is at about 756MB (or something like that, from the details of teh win experience screen under graphics).

Anyone got an idea why Vista is only seeing about 2GB of my 6.25 GB? I'm about to upgrade to Win& 64 Bit but don't want any memory or hardware issue to carry over to the upgrade as the system is working currently.

I'm not in front of the PC but i am remotely connected, as soon as I get out to it I will play around with different slots full, empty etc...
But in the mean time any one knows why I only got 2GB in task manager?




Dell XPS72 with Windows Vista Ultimate Service Pack 2 (build 6002) 32 bit but about to upgrade to 64 bit:
Slot 'DIMM_1' is 2048MB
Slot 'DIMM_3' has 256 MB
Slot 'DIMM_2' is 2048MB
Slot 'DIMM_4' has 2048 MB
Windows Experience rating seeing 6.25, Task manager only seeing 2GB roughly. I was expecting something closer to 4GB (3.7GB), any ideas?

I've done a lot of different stuff but I'm willing to start again and go through all the basic steps.
Thanks for reading,
Derry

That was my understanding as well, but someone at some stage. (Only dell have hand there hands on this box before me). Put in 2GB plus 265mb (fiddles with BIOS) and then teh system accepted the 256 with the 2gb, It works.

The problem is now going to upgrade to 64 bit and adding ram, I'm concerned that there may be something in the BIOS that need to modify to get a clean list of ram.

Thanks for the quick reply.
Derry

Thanks for that, I'm hoping to find an active Dell forum some where as well.

Ta,
Derry

Thanks for all your replies,

I'll definitely being going down the road as per @brinik. rip out that old memory set up and go with just the 4 gb.

A question on the Dell XPS can I leave in the extra 2gb or do you have to have matching pairs?

Whats the story there have not been able to find something specific telling me what will happen if i put in the extra 2gb?

Once i get in front of this machine I will make the changes, and report back on what exactly the BIOS says.

Thanks again,
Derry