Hardware Installing more RAM.

spcefrk

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Hi all. I've built a couple of computers myself and am eagerly awaiting Windows 7 for a lot of reasons. The biggest, is that I've got a 64 bit processor but I'm running Windows XP Home 32-bit. But the other reason I want it, is the support for more than 4GB of RAM.

Long story short, my previous build was fried by a freak electrical storm. Word to the wise: don't ever trust your "surge protector." Mine protected nothing and it's actually a nice model, not a $5 Wal-Mart power strip. My laptop was plugged directly into the same outlet and it was fine.

At any rate, while diagnosing the problem back then I bought 2 new 1GB sticks of RAM (which I am currently using now with my new rebuild). But I believe there is nothing wrong with the old RAM. I know that XP won't handle more than 4GB of video memory and I've got a 512MB Graphics Card.

But what will happen if I plug in the 2 remaining sticks? Will I get 3.5GB of RAM? or will Windows ignore an entire stick?
 

Hielor

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You'll get 3.5(ish).
 

Quick_Nick

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Long story short, my previous build was fried by a freak electrical storm. Word to the wise: don't ever trust your "surge protector." Mine protected nothing and it's actually a nice model, not a $5 Wal-Mart power strip. My laptop was plugged directly into the same outlet and it was fine.
Kind of off-topic, but if nothing else got fried while connected to the surge protector, you can suspect another source. For example, my grandmother's computer got fried recently and would seem that it was actually the phone line that fried everything. Her phones regularly get fried, and if anything else is left connected (she usually unplugs things) they will fry as well. It's fairly regular since it's hard to get a good ground as she lives in an area with a lot of sand.
 

spcefrk

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Kind of off-topic, but if nothing else got fried while connected to the surge protector, you can suspect another source. For example, my grandmother's computer got fried recently and would seem that it was actually the phone line that fried everything. Her phones regularly get fried, and if anything else is left connected (she usually unplugs things) they will fry as well. It's fairly regular since it's hard to get a good ground as she lives in an area with a lot of sand.

Judging by the scarring on the motherboard, it looks like it came in on the ethernet cable and arced over to the power plug on the motherboard. When I tried to turn it back on... no power to the motherboard but everything else appears to be fine. I've kept the motherboard ever since because you've got to really look for the burn but it's there.

Edit: If I feel up to it later, I may try popping the sticks in and see what happens. Been a long day prepping for GTA stuff.

Update: For anyone interested, I now show 3.25 GB of RAM.
 
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