6GB of memory, but 2GB don't show

[thesurvivor190]

I have 6 gigs of crucial ballistix memory at 1600 mhz on my computer. I've had it for about half a year, and it has ran great until about a week ago. One of the sticks is not being recognized by windows, so now i only have 4/6 gigs of memory. The strange thing is, that speccy does see the memory, but it says that only 2 out of 6 memory slots are being used instead of 3 out of 6.

I am using windows 7 ultimate 64bit

 

[DKRON]

go into the bios and check the ram slots and see if all 6 show up

 

[thesurvivor190]

Sorry, I don't see that tab in the bios.

 

[DKRON]

what motherboard do you have?

 

[thesurvivor190]

Its a p6t deluxe v2, ALso i found the ram amount on it and it says 4088 mb

 

[DKRON]

i would say that the last 2gig stick was dodgy or has blown. just incase check out what the warrenty is on them, also have u done flashed the bios to the most updated?

 

[thesurvivor190]

I have never flashed the bios before. the mother board ramslots work just fine. what i find weird is that speccy says there are6 gigs, but windows only sees4

 

[DKRON]

Ok sorry i miss read the speccy bit above, in that case it means the motherboard hasn't activated all memory slots, this could be because of either the bios version is out of date or the voltages and timmings are not set right in the bios, i just recently had exactly the same problem with my 12gig of ram with only 6-8 activating at a time, go to "http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Intel_Socket_1366/P6T_Deluxe_V2/#download" for bios update

 

[thesurvivor190]

Alright thanks so much! Btw, is there a way to backup the old bios, because i don't want to fumble around blindly and somehow mess my computer up.
EDIT: also, which one should i download XD, i have no idea

 

[DKRON]

yes there should be a bios updater program either inside the new version or part of the utilities on that website that will allow you to backup your bios version, also download all bios versions and update in order (safer then jumping straight into the newest one)

 

[thesurvivor190]

kk thanks.
EDIT: so do i download AFUDOS, or AFUDOS BIOS UPDATE TOOL? Or would either work

 

[DKRON]

no problem let me know if it fixes it because the next step gets a fair bit harder

 

[thesurvivor190]

That's strange... I downloaded the 64 bit version, but it says its not compatible with my pc. The 32 bit version doesn't work. (AFUDOS BIOS UPDATE TOOL)

 

[DKRON]

Try the one above

 

[thesurvivor190]

Ive tried both. anyways, m going to go to my friends house to test the ram before flashing the bios. thank you very mucj

 

[DKRON]

this is exactly why i only buy gigabyte motherboards lol, well good luck with that

 

[stanpasquale]

I was going to say that on x86 versions of OS (win xp, vista, win7 etc) you will only be able to use 4 GB of memory. Since you say in your post that it worked fine for quite a while and now its only showing 4 GB - seems to imply that you have a stick that went bad (or is not seated properly) - I have seen memory loosen up so that itś not seated all the way (aka chip creep). I would try each stick (pulling out 2) and verify that the PC see´s the dimm. You might find a bad dimm or more possible that a chip was not seated all the way!

Good luck,
Stan

 

[krs205]

install in pairs

Your motherboard is probably looking for you to install your memory in pairs. I would get another 2 gb stick and see what happens with 4 sticks installed instead of 3.

 

[thesurvivor190]

My motherboard is triple channel, so it wants it in trios.