Can RAM slow down a computer? (1 Viewer)

[Mitch Stevens]

Hi Everyone,

Ok, I had two RAM chips installed in my motherboard already:

Motherboard is a Tyan S2266

512 MB DDR (Double Data Rate) (PNY)
&
256 MB DDR (PNY)

And I have Windows XP Professional Edition installed. Well, for those of you, who have XP Pro, you know, how the start-up screen has a little bar that moves back and fourth? Well, my system always moved the bar from left to right 3 times, and then Windows would come up. Then, I went out and bought MORE ram:

512 MB DDR (Centon)

Now, on that windows start-up screen, the bar moves from left to right a total of 12 TIMES!!!!! It takes SOOOO much longer to start up now, with the new RAM installed. Does anyone know why this happened? Could it be, that it doesn't like (CENTON) brand RAM, or maybe that the more RAM you have, the longer it takes for Windows to come up?

I have not noticed a decrease in speed during normal windows multi-tasking, but I have not noticed an increase in speed either. The only thing I noticed was the startup is much MUCH slower than it was, with only the two RAM chips.

Is there a program that will let me test the new RAM to find out if it's working properly?

 

[Jeff Peake]

I have heard that many motherboards with the KT333 chipset have problems with the 3rd memory slot. Just about every mobo with a 3rd slot doesnt work well if it is used. I dont recall the details, just remember reading this when I built my last PC.

To narrow down the problem, try removing all RAM except the new Centron chip. See if it is still slow. If so, move the centron chip to the other memory slots and see if the speed changes.

If the centron chip works alone, try adding back the other ram.

Test the 3rd slot with the other chips...it is probably either the slot is bad or the new RAM is bad.

Also, when booting up make sure that the amount of ram displayed at the POST screen is correct. Might want to check it again in Windows just to make sure the OS see's the correct amount of ram (if you right click on My Computer and hit PROPERTIES you can see your RAM).


Adding ram should not slow down your boot!

Jeff

 

[Ben_Hud]

try moving the 256 slot into the 3rd slot and putting the new 512 into the second slot. ya or it might just be bad ram.

 

[Glenn Overholt]

At this point you might as well try every combination possible. I have always made sure that memory chips in PC's are always manufacutered by the same company too, but that is probably something that doesn't matter now.

Glenn

 

[Kevin P]

I've noticed that WinNT and 2000 take a bit longer to boot up with more memory, as if maybe it's running a memory test or initialization as part of the startup sequence. A memory count may be part of the hardware detection phase. If XP is the same way, that could be the reason, especially if the added delay has little/no hard drive activity.

 

[Hanson]

I've noticed that mobo is a POS.

Have you updated to the new BIOS? I couldn't even get it to recognize my HD's as ATA100. Kept coming up as PIO4.

It also recognizes the RAM clock as 100MHz even though it's 266MHz DDR. It's not like it accepts SDRAM -- I don't understand.

Hanson

 

[Tekara]

It also recognizes the RAM clock as 100MHz even though it's 266MHz DDR. It's not like it accepts SDRAM -- I don't understand

oh man, thanks for the laugh . . .

okay so then, your ram is rated to run at a 133fsb. DDR doesn't mean twice the frequency it means twice the data per clock cycle. so then your 133FSB rated ram will operate as though it where 266fsb single data rate ram.

your cpu is very much the same, AMD's are double data rate and pentium4's are quad data rate. now then, your system is on a 100fsb even though your ram is rated for 133fsb is only running at 100fsb becuase that is what your system is running at.

I hope that helps you out some, if not fire away with some questions and I'll try and make some sense out of it for you.

 

[Hanson]

I already know that.

I left out some stuff so I can see how it looks like I was naively looking for a 266 clock setting, but what I meant was that I have to manually set the RAM clock at 133 because the mobo auto sets it to 100.

Board still sucks.

 

[Juan Castillo]

The windows XP screen with the night rider style bar is a splash screen that you get instead of normal boot screens. It is more than likely running a memory tester, that in fact, with more memory, takes longer. Can you go into the Bios of that mobo and disable splash screen, or enable boot messages? If you can see what it is doing, "memory test first, then ide controller assignments, then irq/io assignments, before it loads the OS, you wouldn't wonder as to what it is doing any more. Some motherboards will let you hit esc to bypass the memory test, and thus shorten the boot process. Try that .

 

[Hanson]

I don't know why it started after the new RAM, but have you tried this fix?

 

[Mitch Stevens]

Thanks for all the great suggestions guys. I tried what you guys said. I opened the computer up, and tried switching around the ram, and different combinations, and I finally realized that it probably has nothing to do with the ram, because I decided that I would take out the NEW ram, and just try the old one, and I would still get a very long start-up time (that I didn't use to get before).

I've come to the conclusion that the new ram, has nothing to do with the slow-down, but maybe the hard drive isn't spinning as fast as it once was, because everytime I used to capture video, I never got any dropped frames, and I am noticing that I am quickly dropping tons of frames. I think the Hard drive is to blame here. Too bad, because is only 3 months old (Western 120 GB).

Hanson, nope I haven't tried that fix, but I don't have any open ide slots. I have two hard drives, and two CD-RW drives, so I can't disable any of them.