Memory Upgrade Problem

Hello

I have a problem with upgrading my RAM. My PC is a bit on the older side, but I need it to last another year, before I can afford a new one. With the recent new games I am starting to run into problems (slow PC etc) and decided to upgrade some stuff.

The machine was running 2x128 MB PC1600 RAM. Which was definitley low.

I have an Asus A7m266 Motherboard which should support PC2100 RAM. As 1600 is no longer available, I went and bought 512k PC2100.

I tried putting one of the old modules in DIMM1 and the new module in DIMM2. Wasnt sure if it would work due to the different speeds, and it didnt. BIOS saw all of the 600+ memory, but the PC crashed on loading windows. This was kind of expected, so I took the old module out and installed just the one 512k stick. BIOS didnt see any RAM at all and Windows wouldnt start.

So i tried installing the sticks the other way round, but that didnt work. Installed just the 512k in DIMM2, still no memory to be seen in BIOS. Someone told me that I might need matched pairs. So (by now I had blisters on my thumb....those RAM slots are a bastard to change) I went and bought more RAM. I installed the 2 512k sticks and hey presto, BIOS sees 1 and a bit GIG RAM. Cool. But PC crashed on loading Windows again. BIOS then reset the system speed to 100mHz (instead of the normal 133) and the PC works, but still no faster than before. If I set the speed back to 133, I get the crashing problems again.

How can I get my CPU back to a 1.3gHz CPU ? I have had a look through all the BIOS functions, but cant really see anything obvious that springs to mind which could need changing. The BIOS is the original BIOS, but I had a look through the newer versions and all they do is add support for faster CPUs which I dont need. So I am not really wanting to change it.

Here is some System Info. Tell me if you need more:

Motherboard: Asus A7m266
CPU: Athlon 1.3gHz (it was before the XP models came out)
RAM: 2 x 512MB Hynix PC2100 DDR 184 pin DIMM
OS: WinXP Home SP2
GFX: G-Force FX 5500

Cheers
Mad

 

you might wanat to upgrade the bios on the mobo that and chipset drivers from the mfg itself

 

apart from the BIOS upgrade is ther anything else I can do ? as I said before, the more recen BOS upgrades are only to support higher speed CPUs, nothing else.

 

Hi,

Set the cpu to its normal setting then set the ram clock back to run at the same clock speed as the cpu. This should solve your problem.

Rick

 

I would still do an upgrade on the bios. I know it might only be requiered if and only your using a faster CPU, but when you upgrade your bios you sometimes get new content to change settings from. I recently upgraded my bios, and i got more settings than I had before to change.