Only half of my ram is useable

[Omar Wael]

So i just upgraded my pc from 2gb of ram to 8gb (2x4gb sticks) but my BIOS only shows my 4gb as useabe and task manager shows a hardware reserve as 4gb 

I've tried unchecking the maximum memory in the advanced settings in the boot tab of msconfig and all the ram sticks are working normally when i tried them

Specs:

CPU; AMD Phenom ii x4 965

Motherboard: ASUS M4A89GTD-PRO/USB3

RAM: Corsair xms3 2x4gb sticks at 1333mHz

 

[Omar Wael]

13 minutes ago, valdyrgramr said:

Did you put them in the correct slots for dual channel? 

yes i did

 

[dDave64]

That board should run up to 16GB.

 

Have you tried reseating the RAM?

 

where did you get the RAM? It is possible that you got a DOA unit, happens rarely with RAM.

 

try swapping the sticks and then run them one at a time to make sure each is working.

[Omar Wael]

Just now, dDave64 said:

That board should run up to 16GB.

 

Have you tried reseating the RAM?

 

where did you get the RAM? It is possible that you got a DOA unit, happens rarely with RAM.

yes  i have

the system recognizes the 8gb but can only use 4gb

i got the ram from my father and in his system i worked perfectly fine

[YoFavRussian]

10 minutes ago, Omar Wael said:

yes i did

 

So you've put them in your motherboard like illustrated in the manual?

 

[Omar Wael]

3 minutes ago, YoFavRussian said:

So you've put them in your motherboard like illustrated in the manual?

 

yes

[YoFavRussian]

Do you still have the other stick? I've seen RAM identify but not allocated if a stick is bad. Perhaps try using the 2G stick that you have and try swapping it out for one or the other of the 4G sticks, just to see what happens.

[dDave64]

21 minutes ago, Omar Wael said:

yes  i have

the system recognizes the 8gb but can only use 4gb

i got the ram from my father and in his system i worked perfectly fine

 

It almost sounds as if you’re running a 32 bit operating system. You may want to check on that.

 

4gb just so happens to be the limit for 32 bit.

 

its pretty uncommon but I’ve seen 32 bit versions of Windows 10, 8, and 7.

[Omar Wael]

10 minutes ago, YoFavRussian said:

Do you still have the other stick? I've seen RAM identify but not allocated if a stick is bad. Perhaps try using the 2G stick that you have and try swapping it out for one or the other of the 4G sticks, just to see what happens.

yes i do have the other stick I'll be sure to try that

[Omar Wael]

2 minutes ago, dDave64 said:

 

It almost sounds as if you’re running a 32 bit operating system. You may want to check on that.

no i'm pretty sure i'm running 64bit

[YoFavRussian]

3 minutes ago, dDave64 said:

 

It almost sounds as if you’re running a 32 bit operating system. You may want to check on that.

He did say his BIOS only recognizes 4G as usable. If 32-bit was the case the BIOS should still allocate the full 8G.

[dDave64]

10 minutes ago, YoFavRussian said:

He did say his BIOS only recognizes 4G as usable. If 32-bit was the case the BIOS should still allocate the full 8G.

 

He also later stated that the system recognized 8 but the OS only saw 4.

[Omar Wael]

1 minute ago, dDave64 said:

 

He also later stated that the system recognized 8 but the OS only saw 4.

directx diagnostics states 8gb installed but the hardware reserve at 4gb so that leaves only half of my ram to be usable 

[YoFavRussian]

3 minutes ago, dDave64 said:

 

He also later stated that the system recognized 8 but the OS only saw 4.

Perhaps we should have OP check just to make sure it's not that simple.

[Omar Wael]

1 minute ago, YoFavRussian said:

Perhaps we should have OP check just to make sure it's not that simple.

Memory

    8.0 GB DDR3

    Speed:    1333 MHz
    Slots used:    2 of 4
    Form factor:    DIMM
    Hardware reserved:    4.0 GB

    Available    1.9 GB
    Cached    1.7 GB
    Committed    4.1/8.0 GB
    Paged pool    169 MB
    Non-paged pool    132 MB
    In use (Compressed)    2.1 GB (140 MB)

this is what task manager gave me

[YoFavRussian]

2 minutes ago, Omar Wael said:

Memory

    8.0 GB DDR3

    Speed:    1333 MHz
    Slots used:    2 of 4
    Form factor:    DIMM
    Hardware reserved:    4.0 GB

    Available    1.9 GB
    Cached    1.7 GB
    Committed    4.1/8.0 GB
    Paged pool    169 MB
    Non-paged pool    132 MB
    In use (Compressed)    2.1 GB (140 MB)

this is what task manager gave me

Windows will do this if you don't have a 64-bit operating systems. If you use the search bar in Windows and search for System you should be able to find out which OS you have.

[Omar Wael]

2 minutes ago, YoFavRussian said:

Windows will do this if you don't have a 64-bit operating systems. If you use the search bar in Windows and search for System you should be able to find out which OS you have.

ram installed is 8GB (4.0GB usable)

[YoFavRussian]

1 minute ago, Omar Wael said:

ram installed is 8GB (4.0GB usable)

I'm aware, I'm asking you to check and make sure that your system is a 64-bit system and not a 32-bit system.

[Omar Wael]

1 minute ago, YoFavRussian said:

I'm aware, I'm asking you to check and make sure that your system is a 64-bit system and not a 32-bit system.

yes it is a 64-bit system

[YoFavRussian]

5 minutes ago, Omar Wael said:

yes it is a 64-bit system

My suggestion is to try the other RAM channel and the thing I mentioned with the 2G stick.

[Omar Wael]

1 minute ago, YoFavRussian said:

My suggestion is to try the other RAM channel and the thing I mentioned with the 2G stick.

yes I'll try that when i have the time to and I'll be sure to tell you if it works

[Blai5e]

It's not something like reserved for onboard video?

[Omar Wael]

10 minutes ago, Blai5e said:

It's not something like reserved for onboard video?

i do have n unusually large shared memory for my graphics card but It's only 2GB

[Omar Wael]

Hey again,
I solved the issue. Turns out the problem was with the slot. slot 2 (which never had a RAM stick in it) somehow doesn't work but slot 3 does, so i pulled a Verge PC and put the stick in slot 3 and till now no issues, slot 1 was not working as well so i can't put the other there which sucks because no dual channel. Thanks to everyone who helped me i really appreciate it. Have a good one