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Is it ok to add 4 GB + 4 GB to an existing 2 GB + 2GB + 2GB + 2GB configuration?

Dark Mantis

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What you were thinking of was a long time ago and things were different then. A swapfile was required except in exceptional circumstances. Not only that nobody could afford to have the required amounts of memory back then.

Another thing to reduce to recover wasted storage space is the size of the Recycle Bin. Right click on it and select "Properties" then you can alter the size it uses which by default is massive.
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As for the pagefile.sys, you were right... Thanks, now I'm glad I asked the other question, else I wouldn't have find this other tip! 16 additional GB of hard disk space make a BIG difference on a 80GB HD!! (SSD).

But I wanted to explain something that just happened to me and kind of "finishes" the story... Please, let me explain just in case it is useful for somebody else, some day.

My start point was this:

(1)


My new situation is this:

(2)


As I said, the first thing I tried was adding two 4gb sticks to the existing four 2gb sticks at (1). The two 4gb sticks appeared as "dimm slot" but not as "enabled slot" (there appeared 4096 on the first line, and a dash on the second one for both slots 5 and 6).

I don't know if this makes much sense, but I later realised that when trying to add just two 4GB sticks, I didn't properly insert the sticks at slots 5 and 6 - they weren't fully seated into the slot. I found this when I was removing them to continue to point (2), and I was not in the mood for repeating the tests, rebooting, etc., so just forgot about the whole thing.

But today I came to think of it again, and added two of my old 2GB sticks (for a total of 20 GB) in order to see what happened... surprisingly, they were detected and enabled on my mother board. I forgot to take a picture, but the new 4 gb appeared as channel C. tRFC was 60 instead of 86 for these 2 GB slots (whatever that means), but everything seemed fine.

I was so excited! I was going to have 20 GB! Then I started Windows, went into control panel as a final check (Windows key + Pause/Break) and guess what... it said "20 gb installed, 16 available". ???? How come???

To make a long story short, after pulling my hair for a while, I have just found out that Windows 7 Home Premium version (which I happen to use) is limited to 16 GB!!! You have to upgrade to professional, enterprise, etc. if you want more (up to a maximum of 192 GB). Arghh!!! I've always used professional/business versions of Windows, but when reinstalling a couple months ago, I thought I had no need for such versions and home premium would be fine for me. I checked for the upsides/downsides, but I didn't see the 16 gb limitation anywhere!!!! I wish I had read it somewhere, and that's the reason I'm typing this long message, I wish my experience helps somebody to avoid making the same mistake.

So, to summarize... I don't understand what happened the first time (existing four 2GB sticks + two new 4GB sticks). But it looks like four 4 GB sticks plus two 2 GB sticks work okay for the motherboard. Unluckily, I can't absolutely say for sure since Microsoft Windows spoiled my happy ending...

Anyway, at least I got the pagefile.sys and I have 16 GB which is enough for me right now. THANKS!!

« Last Edit: December 18, 2011, 06:58:14 pm by Carlosbcn »

Gloup_Gloup

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Hi Carlosbcn,  ;)

Maybe I have a surprise for you.  :P

I search about ''surprise'' and I return here with more infos...

Gloup_Gloup

Thanks Gloup_Gloup, but don't bother too much, after all I'm fine with 16 gb, and eventually I will reinstall some day and then I will install the W7 Pro version, I guess.

But I'll keep an eye to this thread just in case, he he!! Thanks for reading.

Gloup_Gloup

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Thanks Gloup_Gloup, but don't bother too much, after all I'm fine with 16 gb, and eventually I will reinstall some day and then I will install the W7 Pro version, I guess.

But I'll keep an eye to this thread just in case, he he!! Thanks for reading.

Hi Carlosbcn,  ;)

I think you did well to want to install Windows 7 Professionnal 64bit x64.

You will be able to go up to 192 GB  :P

It is much easier than making not evident changes in the registry base of Windows.

Gloup_Gloup

Dark Mantis

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The original problem I expect was that you had the memory modules in the wrong order. Simple as that!  Normally IF you can get away with running two different sized modules (which isn't often) the larger of them must be in the first slots to be read first, with the smaller in the last slots.

I think what Gloup_Gloup was inferring was that there is a registry hack that allows Windows to see more than 16GB of RAM.
Gigabyte X58A-UD7
i7 920
Dominators 1600 x6 12GB
6970 2GB
HX850
256GB SSD, Sam 1TB, WDB320GB
Blu-Ray
HAF 932

Gigabyte Z68X-UD5-B3
i7 3770K
Vengeance 1600 16GB
6950 2GB
HCP1200W
Revo Drive x2, 1.5TB WDB RAID0
16x DLRW
StrikeX S7
Full water cooling
3 x 27" Iiy