When I boot up this system (a DELL OPTIPLEX GX110) it hangs at the DOS prompts before the system gets to the Windows screen. In the DOS prompts I am seeing the only error I can find which is "memory read/write failure.....Decreasing available memory" Then it finishes booting up and I log in and it hangs at the wonderfull blue screen of death untill I unplug it. I have swapped the power supply & the memory stick and the I reseated the CPU to no avail but I've never seen this error. The entire error is as follows: "memory read/write failure at 0A38F12C, read 38D730D7 expecting 38D738D7 Decreasing available memory The amount of system memory has changed" When I swap memory sticks it only says "The amount of system memory has changed" but it still hangs. Has anyone ever seen this error to know what else I can troubleshoot?
You may have integrated graphics on that PC, where the graphics card-part has gone wrong. That is the only part of a PC that takes memory away the way you describe. If there is an AGP-slot, try a card in there and see what happens. Alternative is a PCI-graphics card. In either case, see if you can disable the onboard graphics. You might also try to go in your BIOS. There it might "shadow" ROM or Video-RAM. See if disabling that helps.
At first no but since you suggested it I swapped with another GX110 and I got the same result. Also, if it were the memory card wouldn't I be getting a beep code. I didn't think it would let me log on (as far as I could log on anyways)? Realblackstuff: I'm troublshooting everything else right now