BSoD with more than 4GB RAM

I'm having a problem with my Windows 7 64bit installation.

First a bit of history:
I bought my computer 3 years ago with Vista64 installed. I wiped the HD and installed XP Home and had no problems with it. I recently purchased Win7 to have a dual boot system so I could run som 64 bit programs and take advantage of increased memory capabilities.

My first attempt a installing W7 failed until I removed all but 2 GB RAM. I now have Windows7 64 bit installed; but it won't start up if I have more than 3 GB RAM installed. As soon as the startup screen disappears I get a BSoD. This doesn't happen with 3GB or less RAM.

I've run the Drive Sweeper app and installed the latest drivers for the video card; I run the Windows Startup Repair tool but nothing seems to work. There's no sense in me using Windows7 if I'm limited to just 3GB of memory.

System specs:
Acer Aspire M1100
AMD Athlon 64 x2 4000+ dual core porcessor
3GB DDR2 PC5400 RAM (originally came with 2GB)
ATI Radeon HD 5570 with 1GB DDR3 memory. (came with onboard graphics only)
I've replaced the PSU with a 400W (factory installed was 250W).

I've run out of ideas on what to do (short of buying a new motherboard & CPU). Everything I've read about upgrading and my system specs says I should be able to install 8GB of RAM; but I can't.

Included are the Memory dump files and a picture of the BSoD.

DarkXeno said:

One thing I would do is goto Acers web site and see if they have a BIOS update for the mother board.

No updates for the BIOS. When I asked if my system was capable of being upgraded to W7; their reply was that only Vista was supported for my system.

What's really bugging me is that I can run W7 with up to 6GB RAM if I use M$'s standard VGA video driver; but not with the onboard graphics or my graphics card.

DarkXeno said:

BWSman said:

DarkXeno said:

One thing I would do is goto Acers web site and see if they have a BIOS update for the mother board.

No updates for the BIOS. When I asked if my system was capable of being upgraded to W7; their reply was that only Vista was supported for my system.

What's really bugging me is that I can run W7 with up to 6GB RAM if I use M$'s standard VGA video driver; but not with the onboard graphics or my graphics card.

Have you tried the newest drivers for video from AMD website for the Radeons?

I did that (mentioned it in my first post). No joy.

I have run Memtest on all the RAM I have (2 x 2 Gig and 4 x 1 Gig) and everything checks out (forgot to mention that in the first post). I've also ran the test on a good stick in all the memory slots without anything showing up.

DarkXeno said:

Ok I have two more things for you to try.

1) go into BIOS and see if there is a way to reset it back to factory settings maybe something got changed in there that the system doesn't like with more the 3gig in.

2) if that does not work have you loaded Service Pack 1 for Windows 7?

OK; I'll try the reset to factory default and see if that will work. I did initiate an update and there were a bunch that were installed; but I don't know for sure whether SP1 was installed specifically.

I've reset the BIOS to the factory settings and managed to boot past the startup screen; but it was very slow, the video kept cutting out and it finally crashed with the same issues as before.

On top of that; resetting the BIOS has caused some problems. My system hangs on the BIOS startup screen (the "Press Delete to enter BIOS" screen) and the CPU fan will go into high speed. Pressing the DEL key or the F12 (for Boot Menu) doesn't do any thing. If i press the power button briefly; the fans will slow down and pressing the power button again allows a normal start-up.

I'm beginning to suspect that it might be a power issue and the various components aren't getting a proper voltage supply. Everything is nominal in the BIOS screen when I check it; but that isn't under a load situation.

I might say the h**l with it and buy a new MB & CPU combo.