Solved How much Ram?

[michael diemer]

I recently discovered why I kept having display driver failures. It turned out to be bad ram. I had boosted my ram a few years ago from 3GB to 8GB, maxing out my Gateway/Athlon dual core PC. I removed the replacement ram (Kingston ValuRam) and put back in the ram that came with the computer. Suddenly no more DDF's! I can play solitaire and Mahjong again.However, I now have only 3GB ram, which is not enough to run 64bit stuff. My W7 is 64 bit. It's running fine, and for what I do with this rig, it may be enough. All I use it for is internet, gaming is limited to the above-mentioned, not exactly CPU-hogging stuff.
So my question is, should I leave well-enough alone, or should I try to figure out which of the replacement ram sticks was bad, thus getting my rig back up at least to 4GB, and thus 64bit capable?

Thanks, Mike

 

[richc46]

No Mike
When you buy ram, you replace them all.
The above is fact
Now opinion
Ram is cheap enough, buy more to have your computer operate the way it should.

 

[michael diemer]

Thank you, Rich. Are you saying I should not mix the two different rams? They are both Kingston, but may not be exactly the same. The original ram was two 1GB sticks, plus two .5GB sticks, giving me a total of 3GB. That's what I put back in now, and computer is working fine. I was thinking of replacing one of the 1GB original sticks with one of the replacement valuram 2GB sticks, and see if things were still good. then I'd have 4GB, making it 64bit capable. If that is not kosher, I was thinking of trying to buy the exact ram that the computer came with, to add that in and boost it that way to maybe 6GB. But you may be saying I should just buy all new ram?

 

[richc46]

It is a known fact, buy all new. There may be very minor differences in ram that are bought at different times, enough to hurt performance. You seem to know what you need, but maybe you might get other leads from this website. You can buy the ram anywhere.
Welcome to Crucial USA

 

[Layback Bear]

michael I presume that you don't want to buy a problem.
When you buy mismatched ram that is exactly what you are doing.

Please follow richc46 suggestion and buy all matched ram that meats the specs of your system.

It would also be helpful to know the exact motherboard you have.

 

[whs]

With the Crucial System Scanner you can quickly determine what options you have.

Crucial.com - Crucial System Scanner

 

[michael diemer]

michael I presume that you don't want to buy a problem.
When you buy mismatched ram that is exactly what you are doing.

Please follow richc46 suggestion and buy all matched ram that meats the specs of your system.

It would also be helpful to know the exact motherboard you have.

Thanks, my motherboard is: Nvidia 6150Se

I'm just wondering if I should be increasing my ram from 3GB to 4GB or higher, since I have a 64 bit windows 7 OS.

(To recap: I started out with the ram currently in the computer, 3GB Kingston. Then, 4 years ago, I upgraded the ram to 8GB, as well as installing 64 bit windows. This was all new, matched Kingston ValuRam, I did not mix it with the original ram, also Kingston, but not ValuRam. But it caused display driver failures. So I recently took out the "new" ram and put back in what came in the computer. The display driver failures went away).

 

[ignatzatsonic]

michael I presume that you don't want to buy a problem.
When you buy mismatched ram that is exactly what you are doing.

Please follow richc46 suggestion and buy all matched ram that meats the specs of your system.

It would also be helpful to know the exact motherboard you have.

Thanks, my motherboard is: Nvidia 6150Se

I'm just wondering if I should be increasing my ram from 3GB to 4GB or higher, since I have a 64 bit windows 7 OS.

(To recap: I started out with the ram currently in the computer, 3GB Kingston. Then, 4 years ago, I upgraded the ram to 8GB, as well as installing 64 bit windows. This was all new, matched Kingston ValuRam, I did not mix it with the original ram, also Kingston, but not ValuRam. But it caused display driver failures. So I recently took out the "new" ram and put back in what came in the computer. The display driver failures went away).

There's no reason to add more RAM unless you have some reason to believe that you are currently using all the RAM you now have.

What are your reasons?

You said in your first post that "it's running fine".

Why in particular do you think that 3 GB of RAM isn't enough " to run 64 bit stuff", as stated in your first post? It's plenty if you aren't using all of it.

You may be using all of it and starving for more, but you haven't said why you think that is so.

 

[Layback Bear]

I have run Windows 7/64 with 4 gigs of ram all the way to 32 gigs of ram and everything in between. It all depends what one uses the computer for.

A sweat post in my opinion for Windows 7/64 is 8 gigs of ram.
That being said 8 gigs of ram is more ram than most will use most of the time. The extra ram is there if for what ever reason one starts doing things on the computer that needs more ram.

I would also recommend doing this like others have suggested and let us know the results.


Crucial.com - Crucial System Scanner

When I google this I get everything but the needed information about your motherboard.
Nvidia 6150Se

Where are you getting this Nvidia 6150Se information.
Point me to a websit I can get all the specs of the motherboard.

 

[michael diemer]

Ignatz,


I thought if you had 64 bit windows, then you needed at least 4GB ram. Or something like that...I could be wrong.

 

[whs]

I thought if you had 64 bit windows, then you needed at least 4GB ram. Or something like that...I could be wrong.

The recommended minimum for 64bit is 2GBs - although it also runs in less, just slower. If you have more than 4GBs, then you need 64bit because 32bit can only address up too 4GBs.

 

[ignatzatsonic]

You are wrong.

You need 64 bit Windows to utilize more than roughly 3.5, but if you don't use more than 3.5, there isn't much of a reason to upgrade to 64 bit Windows. How much RAM you "need" depends on what you do with the PC.

I have 4 GB and 64 bit Windows. I don't think I've EVER used more than 3 of the 4. I check frequently.

You can run Windows 7 with less than 1 GB. My system idles using about 1.4 GB.

 

[Layback Bear]

Windows 7/64 allows you to use more that 4 gigs of ram it does not mean your have to run more that 4 gigs of ram.

 

[michael diemer]

Aha, so I am ok with 3GB? Cool! Otherwise I'd spend 75.00 and have 7 sticks of useless ram lying around.

I used this computer for my DAW, Sonar, but I have a new rig for that with 16GB of ram (can take 32, so I'm set there).

Now I just use the old one for the internet and everyday stuff. I think the 3GB will be fine.

Thanks for the help, all!

 

[Layback Bear]

If you are happy then I'm happy for you.