adding DIMM

[Succuba]

I two computers that are pretty much identical running windows xp. On one computer when I add a DIMM of equal size windows xp boots right up no problem. On the other computer when I add a DIMM of equal size it give me a dos screen that says there have been some hardware change and want me to boot up on safe mode or offers me to boot up normally and when I do the computer starts to load stuff very slow and never finishes loading up. Is there a security setting or something that I may have set in windows xp or something that is making windows xp not accept ram changes or something on one computer but not on other?

[Svarien]

sounds like possible bad ram which is semi common. also some computers DIMMS must be installed in pairs vice single

[Succuba]

I think either winxp or harddrive has some limitation. I have gotten 1.5G to work where 1G(PC2700-333MHz) and one 500M(PC2100-266Mhz) but it will not work when I put only Two 1G(PC2700-333MHz) in 2 of the 3 slots. The mb is supposed to support up to a total of 3G in 3slots. the computer will boot into DOS with the two 1G. But if i try to reboot into winxp or even reinstall winxp with the two 1G (total 2G) the hardrive freezes when it trying to copy files to the harddrive. With the two 333MHz the mb is suppose to revert to 333MHz if 3 slots of memory are used or if 266MHz memory is used it will revert to the slower 266MHz speed. But, to me it seems to be a max memory limit at this point and I'm not sure to blame the ASUS A7S333 mb, WINXP, or the harddrive or the format of the harddrive being FAT32 maybe cannot handle 2G DDR ram writing to it at once. If anyone has any insight on this feel free give opinion.

Thank you,

Succuba

[Gesper]

if you have 2 sticks of 1G try each with the 500mg stick (the configuration you know works)

This should at least tell you if you have a bad stick.

[Succuba]

I can manage to get it to run with 1G(PC2700-333Mhz) memory at the faster DDR speed but it has been causing graphics lockups and crashes. I am now forcing it to run the 1G(PC2700-333MHz) DDR at the PC2100-266MHz speed by using jumpers and it runs alot more stable and is actually faster. It still will not run two of the 1G(PC2700-333MHz) simultaneously even when forced to the slower bus speed. But, I can get it to run at the lower bus speed with 1G(PC2700-333MHz) + 500M(PC2100-266Mhz). What I think is that there is 2 things happening here. One, the mb, video, ddr, micro combination is not entirely stable at 333Mhz. Two, I think WinXP (FAT32) will only run up to 1.5G of total DDR memory. Basically, the stats provided by ASUS for the A7S333 board are not entirely accurate. The BIOS recognizes all the combinations of memory and seems to be adjusting itself properly. So, I'm just going to run both computers with 1.5G at the slower busspeed. Also, interesting is that when using the higher busspeed the micro bus is at 133MHz and the DDR bus speed is at 166MHz which requires a 4:5 ratio in the bios - this is the ratio that seems to be unstable. Only the combos where the ratio is 1:1 (133MHz:133MHz cooresponds to the 266MHz DDR and 100MHz:100MHz) does the computer work nicely.