1 gig on A7N8X

I had been running on 2x256 for about the last year.
I went and bought another 512 yesterday to get it to 1 gig ramm.

Computer counts up all memory and says it's good at post.

Computer will not however boot the OS. I run linux, and even though i know it isn't nessasary, i went throught the trouble of reinstalling linux. It got to the part where it goes to write to the HD and the whole system freezes.

Odd... So i went and put in a Win 2k cd to see if it was a problem with linux. It gets to the part where it checks system specs, and it crashes.

I thought my HD was fried. I took out one of the 256 dimm's and everything is good in the world. OS installed just fine.

Put the 256 back in, to take it back to 1 gig mem after the os is installed, and it crashes. Happens with either OS...

So i have a 256 in slot 1 and a 512 in slot 3 and another 256 sitting here looking at me.

What is the trick? I have the Rev 1 MB, and have never liked it. This is just another reason...

Kinda sounds like one of the sticks went bad. Have you tested each individually?

download memtest86. This program must be started in windows and a copy of extracted files in floppy is needed for reboot into DOS to load memtest86. This program can test your memory. I have found my memory does not like slot 1 (black for deluxe rev 2).

Yes, all Dimms are good. You can run memtest on them for days and they dont error.

I did however find that, when mixing 256 and 512 dimms, and you have a nVidia Graphics card. It may have a address conflict, and this is what i have....

Allthough, if you run matching pairs 2x256 or 2x512 it is fine. Go figure....

Right now, i have 1x256 and 1x512, If i add the 3rd 256 chip, it colides with the graphics card resources and all comes to a halt.

How do you know you're getting a conflict?

Just a note, the AGP bus and the memory bus are two completly different resource pipelines. They do not share, well, anything.

Plenty of folks on this board have successfuly reported running 3 dimms of different size at dual channel setting (2x256, 1x512). I would recheck memory timings and settings under memtest at REDUCED speeds. Also, if you can maybe test your stick on another machine help determine cause of your instability.

I have another machine sitting next to me. The 3rd Dimm is in it now, and running just fine. The FAQ in the nvidia manual is where i got the information about the conflict.

clash_27 said:

The FAQ in the nvidia manual is where i got the information about the conflict.

Click to expand...

Then could you be a little more specific and share with us all what it says? I'm curious...

I had the same problem. I was running 2x256 and grabbed a stick of 512, same brand (Corsair XMS PC3200) and it wouldn't boot the OS.

You have to have the sticks in a certain order to get it to work. I personally said screw it and sold the two sticks of 256 and bought another 512 and I can use any order. ASUS says that the last slot must be the largest stick you have, so the 512. It's "iffy" and I'd just get another 512 stick and ditch the 2x256.

ok, for running dual with different memory make sure the timings are set to the most relaxed of the stock settings of the memory, then make sure and give it 2.7vdimm

Okay I think that it has nothing to do with mixing different size ram sticks. More or less it must have to do with the number of sticks in the a7n8x board. 3 sticks of ram froze for me. 2 and 1 stick worked fine. btw the freezing in linux destroyed my 3rd stick of ram.

this is not a windows problem!

I ran 3 sticks in 2.4.22 kernel for quite awhile. the nvidia linux chipset drivers were installed.

I update kernel to 2.6- i couldn't install the nviida linux chipset drivers. I do have an fx5200 with the nvidia driver installed.

my memory was perfeclty stable in memtest86 before i installed the 2.6 kernel. The same day i installed that kernel it was freezing. I suspected hardware instalbility on a faster kernel?? I underclocked everything and run it, still freezes.

At this point I thought it was a software problem. I tried to figure out how to get it to stop freezing. I would change some stuff and underclock it more and go back in and do my thing and after a day or so bam hard lock. it was stable enough to go for awhile so i didn't think that it was hurting the hardware ;however, after a day or so my computer would no longer boot with the 3rd stick of ram! The 3rd stick no longer ever boots even by itself and is completely destroyed!

Thanks linux... or nvidia- well i just don't know who to thank lol

What about mixing two sizes, and two speeds (and, for that matter, three brands?)

I.e., 512 Kingston HyperX PC2700, 256 Geil Ultra PC3200, and 256 Kingmax superRAM PC3200

I've got the 512 in new, but I'm itchin' to see what happens with the others...but I don't want to take them out of their sealed bags if things wouldbe a bust. I'd rather take the advice I got from someone earlier and just get another stick of 512 KHx PC2700.

Or not.

Anyone?

I had 2 sticks of 256 pc2700 and a stick of 512 pc3200. ran fijne. even overclocked. I took out the 2 256 megs to build another machine. And am getting another 512 pc3200 this week.

Smooth. Thank you for the information.

I'm running 3 / 512 sticks of Kingston HyperX PC 3200 in mine with no problem.

if you are having problems, i dont know if this is how you have it, but are the 2x256 in slots 2 and 3? the blue ones?

if so, it will run dual channel (those 2 combined to = 1x512) and then the second 512mb in slot 1 will act as another stick of ram. should match perfectly.

btw, are they different manufacturers?

t1mex
btw, are they different manufacturers?

Click to expand...

Yes.

I've had them set up like you described- the 512 in slot 1 and the two 256 in slots 2 & 3, but, and this is weird, CPU-Z is showing not only that I'm in dual channel, which shouldn't be possible with the A7N8X-X, but that the 512 is in slot 2 and the slot #2 256 is in slot 1.

I checked this, to make sure I wasn't seeing things, by swapping the ram around and putting the #2 256 in slot 1 and moving the 512 to slot 2. The 512 listed as slot 1 in CPU-Z and the 256, physically in slot 1, listed in slot 2. And again, it showed that I was in dual channel mode.

I'm confused.

Thanks linux... or nvidia- well i just don't know who to thank

Click to expand...

Seems almost impossible for software to have burnt up a stick of ram....