Hauppauge Fix: How do I limit RAM that Win7 sees?

[freewheeling]

Apparently a lot of Hauppauge devices won't work on Windows 64-bit systems with 4GB of RAM or more. Rather that physically removing one of my two memory sticks in order to keep my Hauppauge HD PVR from locking up my system is there a way in Windows 7 to limit the amount of memory seen to, say, 3GB?

I gather that a command in the boot.ini file in Windows XP called "burnmemory" will do it, but is there a similar solution in Windows 7.

And yes, this is the last Hauppauge product I ever buy. Their handling of this issue literally defines contempt for their customer base.

 

[Qdos]

Pity you haven't named your Hauppauge product in your system specs.

They're not perfect in W7 yet, however show me TV cards which are!!!!!!

You tried asking on the Hauppauge Forums for help?

 

[seekermeister]

They're not perfect in Windows 7 yet, however show me TV cards which are!!!!!!

I totally agree that nothing is perfect, including TV tuners, but the Dvico FusionHDTV, that I have installed in my primary rig is far superior to the Hauppauge PVR 150 in my secondary rig.

 

[mpcrsc562]

what problem(s) are you having specifically? i have a hvr-1250, running on a windows 7 ultimate 64 bit system with 8 gigs of ram and other than an occasional "low bit rate" message i get, i haven't had any problems with it. i mostly get that message when i'm watching a clear qam channel -- i hardly ever get that message when watching regular cable channels (and if i get the message while watching a regular cable channel, all i need to do is change the channel, then change it back to fix it)

 

[freewheeling]

Pity you haven't named your Hauppauge product in your system specs.

They're not perfect in W7 yet, however show me TV cards which are!!!!!!

You tried asking on the Hauppauge Forums for help?

I did name it. It's not a card, but the HD-PVR. Appears to have the same problem as the cards (all cards), though. I'm a member of a number of Video forums, and it's clear that Hauppauge isn't even interested in solving the problem. However, it only effects 64-bit systems, because 32-bit systems can't recognize 4GB of memory. I think this is the right forum to ask about limiting recognition of RAM in Windows 7, not as a solution, but as a workaround until Hauppauge users make enough of a fuss that the drivers and firmware are updated.

Again, in lieu of that, there must be a way to limit the RAM that Win7 sees analogous to the "burnmemory" command for XP?

 

[freewheeling]

what problem(s) are you having specifically? i have a hvr-1250, running on a windows 7 ultimate 64 bit system with 8 gigs of ram and other than an occasional "low bit rate" message i get, i haven't had any problems with it. i mostly get that message when i'm watching a clear qam channel -- i hardly ever get that message when watching regular cable channels (and if i get the message while watching a regular cable channel, all i need to do is change the channel, then change it back to fix it)

Well, people report various problems. For me, the system freezes every so often (once or twice a day). I'm not *totally* certain that the RAM problem is what's causing it, but it's next on my list. In lieu of physically removing memory this seems like a better workaround. I've done memory checks, and the RAM is OK. Not a software problem.

 

[freewheeling]

They're not perfect in Windows 7 yet, however show me TV cards which are!!!!!!

I totally agree that nothing is perfect, including TV tuners, but the Dvico FusionHDTV, that I have installed in my primary rig is far superior to the Hauppauge PVR 150 in my secondary rig.

Thanks. I'm already considering what I buy to replace this. Downgrading the system's IQ seems like a pretty dirty workaround for what's basically a faulty driver, but from the discussion on many forums Hauppauge is totally ignoring the issue. I figure I'll use the workaround until I can replace their product, or until they decide to fix the drivers, whichever comes first. I'm sure open to something else, though.

 

[freewheeling]

Pity you haven't named your Hauppauge product in your system specs.

They're not perfect in W7 yet, however show me TV cards which are!!!!!!

You tried asking on the Hauppauge Forums for help?

Beg your pardon, it wasn't in my specs because I only recently got the thing. I've fixed that now.

But again, I think this is the right forum for this question. If I can reduce the RAM artificially then I can either confirm or rule that out as a cause of the system lockups. Might be something else, but the RAM problem with Hauppauge is widely reported.

 

[seekermeister]

Thanks. I'm already considering what I buy to replace this. Downgrading the system's IQ seems like a pretty dirty workaround for what's basically a faulty driver, but from the discussion on many forums Hauppauge is totally ignoring the issue. I figure I'll use the workaround until I can replace their product, or until they decide to fix the drivers, whichever comes first. I'm sure open to something else, though.

I have owned several Hauppauge cards, and never liked any of them. Since I installed my Fusion, the only problem that I have had with it is that I broke the tiny little cable that runs between the power pins on the motherboard and the tuner, which is only necessary for it to be able to boot the machine, to play/record a program via it's scheduler. I did email Dvico about a replacement cable, and they said that it was too small of a component with them to bother with...this has been my one negative experience with them.

 

[freewheeling]

I did email Dvico about a replacement cable, and they said that it was too small of a component with them to bother with...this has been my one negative experience with them.

Eeeww, that's not good. I recently contacted Newegg about a power supply I bought from them that had gone bad within 30 days, and they just refunded my money and told me to dispose of the item any way I liked. Now *that's* impressive service.

BTW I did find out how to limit the RAM on Windows 7, on the Hauppauge forum. Here's the recipe:

[FONT=&quot]- Start Windows Vista/7
- Enter the command msconfig into the search/run bar
- Click on the Boot tab
- Select Windows Vista/7 and open Advanced options..
- Check the box next to Maximum memory
- And enter a value lower than 4000 (Mb) (3800 or lower recommended)
- Click twice on OK and restart Windows.

[/FONT]

So if it still locks up, then it wasn't the memory recognition problem, and if it doesn't I at least have a workaround.

 

[freewheeling]

Well, it was not the RAM problem. I reduced the RAM and my computer is still locking up. I can still see the desktop but the mouse is frozen and it doesn't respond to key presses, and the time and date are also frozen. Is there a way I can set up some sort of system log so that I can track the system as it enters one of these frozen states?

 

[mic414]

Freewheeling: you were on the right track with the memory fix, in general. I was having the same issue - Hauppage WinTV-PVR-150 didn't work on Win 7 64-bit 4GB RAM - and the memory downsizing did fix it. Thanks for digging out the solution, appreciate it.

There's one small glitch: I set the memory size to 3.95 GB in boot options, but the actual result is that Windows reduced the usable size to 3.5GB. Seems like there are some fixed increments it can handle. Does anyone know if this is perhaps configurable, maybe in the registry?

 

[mic414]

Hmmm.... I may have found a nice workaround to the RAM issue of several Hauppage cards.

As I said above, I managed to get my Hauppage WinTV-PVR-150 work by reducing the available memory in Win7. It bothered me though that Windows reduced the size of the memory to 3.5GB, not to the value I set (3.95GB). So I was playing around with it, and in one test case, I actually reset everything back to the original, i.e. went back to 4GB.

The interesting thing is that my Hauppage card kept working on! - even though I have 4GB again.

So it seems like if you make a "round-trip", you can fool the Hauppage driver to somehow preserve the working state - and you can still have all your memory.