How much ram do I have?

Hi everyone! I bought a refurbished Compaq V5000 laptop that seems pretty great- but I have some questions that are out of my sphere. I paid the company to kick up my ram to 1 gb, and when I open control panel and check System, it reads that I have 736 mbs of ram. Am I looking in the wrong place, not understanding, or have i been shortchanged? Also, when I was trying to get my router set up, I just couldn't use the Ethernet port. The tech insists that he had tested it, but I tried a few different Ethernet cables and no go- the only way the Ethernet connection works is using the USB cable. I hope this isn't like the time a mechanic told me he replaced my very problematic carburator- but the minute I checked the suspiciously neat and clean carb- whoa- it had the exact same numbers as my old one!!!! ie- dumb lady will never know....
Third- my cursor and page dance all over the place- I've had this problem before, so I downloaded the latest driver for my synaptics, the problem is better, but there is still page movement and sort of "chunky" cursor movement and letter placement- any ideas?
Thanks!
kat

 

1. crucial run their memory scanner and they can tell you how much memory you have.
2. go to device manager and see if there are any conflicts in that area

3. I'm not to sure about, someone else will have to assist you with the screen movement

 

Run SIW and look at memory. http://majorgeeks.com/download4387.html

Most likely you have an onboard GPU that shares memory with your computer's RAM.

HMM, I may be wrong there, mine has shared RAM , and shows 2G in System, but SIW will tell you what sticks are in the computer without having to open it up.

 

I can't help you with the ethernet issues, but I can help you with this memory thing. The short answer is, "you have most likely not been shortchanged". For a longer answer, keep reading.

Basically, laptops don't have dedicated graphics cards, so they have to set aside some of the RAM to use for generating graphics. Same with sound, internet connections, and all the other good stuff. "System" in Control Panel, where you were looking, only tells you how much is available for Windows to use after the drivers have claimed their part. In a laptop it's going to be less than the installed amount.

Assuming you have Windows XP installed, go to Start menu, then to Run... and type in "msinfo32" -- without the ""! -- then hit Enter. Give it a while to scan your system for all the information and then look in the System Overview. The amount of installed physical memory should be 1GB, and the amount of available memory on the line just below will be less than that. "Installed physical memory" is what is plugged into your motherboard, and when all else fails, this part of XP is usually right. Note that I am doing this from memory (typing from a Vista 64-bit system), so the exact labels might be a little bit different, but the basic gist is that if you go to msinfo32 via the Run... field in the start menu it will tell you how much memory you really have installed.

As for your chunky cursor and stuff, try reinstalling your graphics driver, or updating it if a later version is available.

 

My modem has both! But then it is a combo modem-router.

 

My router is the very basic Belkin- but I have an Ethernet cable that has an Ethernet plug at one end and a USB at the other. I tried three conventional Ethernet cables-no go.

 

Great advice as always, from Great people!!!!