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Award BIOS in ECS 845GV-M3 MoBo sees only 256MB/Slot

Posted: Tue Oct 07, 2008 9:27 am
by frog88
The system [Motherboard ECS 845GV-M3 with 2-DIMM-slots and Pentium 4 Socket 478 in Fry's white box GQ5080 running WinXP] has been running for 2 years with 256MB i.e. 1 module DDR PC2700 CL2.5 256MB. I upgraded the system last week with one Corsair VS1GB333G i.e. 1 module DDR PC2700 CL2.5 1GB. The system's Award BIOS only sees 256MB of the 1GB module i.e. BIOS sees only 256MB when only the 1GB module is present or sees only 512MB when the 2 modules [256MB & 1GB] are present. Seems to me that the BIOS limits the memory to 256MB per slot. Note that Memtest86+ only sees 256MB of the 1GB when only the 1GB module is present.
I searched for an "OS Install Mode" that could limit to 256MB [per slot?] but could not find it in Award BIOS. Any suggestion ?

Posted: Tue Oct 07, 2008 1:30 pm
by cp
the problem is the chipset, not the BIOS.
the corsair memory module is 128Mx64. the i845 supports 128Mx8 SingleSide/DoubleSide or 128Mx16 SS which result in 128MB/256MB or 64MB. so the corsair module is 128Mx64 DS of which the i845 supports 128Mx8 DS = 256MB. perfectly normal, but nothing you would have wanted. the corsair module can be used with SIS or VIA chipsets but not with the i845. if you would want 1GB RAM for your machine you should buy either ONE MODULE 512Mx8 DS (1GB) or TWO MODULES 256Mx8 DS (512MB each) or TWO MODULES 512Mx8 SS (also 512MB each).