Blank screen in Windows with 3GB, but fine with 2GB

[RobNorthcott]

I've got an oldish machine that's used for mostly office apps. It's an MSI K8T Neo mobo with an A64 3200+, 2GB DDR and GeForce 6600GT, running XP SP3. If I add another 1GB stick of ram in the 3rd slot it will boot as far as the Windows logo screen with "scrolly bar", then just as you'd expect the mouse cursor to appear it turns the monitor off. It doesn't look to have hung - the drive light keeps flashing as if it's still loading Windows. Just looks like the video card driver won't work. Won't go into safe mode either. Take the extra ram out and all is normal again.

I know it's an old board, so I wouldn't be that surprised not to get it to work, but it just seems so close, and that extra GB would be very useful. The POST memory check sees all 3 gigs. Any ideas?

The memory itself is fine, BTW.

Rob

 

[Lemon13]

at what speed is the ram set, when all 3 slots are used it only runs at ddr333 instead of ddr400, and the board is quiet selectiv what ram is supported, have a look at

http://eu.msi.com/index.php?func=proddesc&maincat_no=1&cat2_no=&cat3_no=&prod_no=565

M. Knorr

MCSE, MCTS, MCSA, CCNA

 

[RobNorthcott]

Thanks for that - I knew the board was fussy with the 3rd slot, but I hadn't noticed the 333 max speed thing. I'll have another go sometime and check it isn't trying to run at 400. I borrowed the memory from work and it's all out on site with one of our blokes at the mo so I won't be able to try again for a few days.

In the mean time, any other suggestions welcome

Rob

 

[kjv1611]

Have you tried swapping the RAM modules around? I mean, move position 1 to position 3 or 4 or whatever, and move the new one to the first position?

Or make sure that the matching pair (if any match) are in "matching" slots?

Just something simple to try anyway. Usually doesn't work, I think, but I have seen success just swapping modules around in the past.

--

"If to err is human, then I must be some kind of human!" -Me

 

[RobNorthcott]

I can't say I tried every combination, but I did put the "new" stick in with one of the existing ones just to prove it was OK. There aren't really "pairs" of slots - it's an old 3-slot single-channel board. They are notoriously fussy about using the third slot - even warns you that it quite likely won't work in the manual! It could be that it'll work with three absolutely identical sticks (although what I've got are all the same make and speed), all bought from the same batch, but if I can't get it to work with what I've got easy access to I'm not about to throw money at an old machine for the sake of that. I should be able to grab another stick from work in the next few days and I'll have another play with it.

Thanks,

Rob

 

[BadBigBen]

In the BIOS, change the AGP aperture size, increase it to 128mb or 256mb...


Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[RobNorthcott]

Another thing to try, thanks. I think it's set to 128 at the moment. I'll report back when I can get hold of that memory again.

Rob

 

[RobNorthcott]

OK, I've got the spare memory again tried a few things again this morning.

Forcing the memory speed didn't make any difference - I think the board does that on its own.

Setting the AGP aperture _did_ make a difference, but I could only make it worse. It was set to 128mb before, and anything lower than that made no difference. But set to 256mb the machine wouldn't boot at all - no POST screen or beeping, nothing at all - had to reset the cmos to set it back.

I tried various arrangements of memory in different slots, but couldn't get it to work. The one thing I couldn't try was three absolutely matching sticks - best I could find was one pair and an odd one (2 Kingston and one Corsair), but all DDR 400 C3.

I think I'll give up now - not worth the time on an old machine (and a board that officially only supports 2GB according to the original manual). Annoying though, because after the screen goes blank it carries on booting quite happily into Windows and I can shut it down with Alt-F4 - just no display. Grrr.

Rob

 

[Freestone]

If Windows boots and allows you to shut down then it doesn't sound like a memory issue, per se. Try running a pass of a memory tester, such as memtest86+ (

http://www.memtest.org/).

If that runs, chances are good that the memory and board combination are fine.

I adjustment of the AGP apeture upwards affecting POST, and the blank screen during Windows loading almost make it seem like a video memory remapping issue rather than a memory issue. Almost like remapping is occuring at the 3GB memory line rather than the 4GB line.

What BIOS revision level is the board at? Looks to be quite a few revisions here:

http://eu.msi.com/index.php?func=downloaddetail&type=bios&maincat_no=1&prod_no=565

The first revision (1.1) has an interesting entry: "Fixed Windows XP system info report the wrong physical memory size

 

[RobNorthcott]

Thanks. I had a reasonably new bios on there (can't remember which one exactly), but updated it to the latest one when I was trying to get this memory to work. Sorry, forgot to mention that. I agree with you I don't think there's anything wrong with the memory/board as such, just the way it deals with the AGP card when 3GB are installed. A colleage of mine told me some boards have a "remap to 4GB" option that has to be set when running large amounts of ram, but I'm pretty sure the K8T doesn't have anything like that. Perhaps I should try another video card (PCI one?), or a different version of the nVidia driver...

Rob

 

[kjv1611]

RobNorthcott,

You say your motherboard is fine with 2GB, but not with 3GB.

Then just this past weekend, you said

not worth the time on an old machine (and a board that officially [highlight]only supports 2GB[/highlight] according to the original manual).

Sounds like the only way it would support more than 2GB RAM is if there were a BIOS update that would allow such. Did any of the BIOS updates mention allowing for more RAM?

--

"If to err is human, then I must be some kind of human!" -Me

 

[RobNorthcott]

The maximum supported ram on that board is a bit vague - some documatation seems to say 2GB, some says 3GB but only in some combinations. Mine's quite an early board, but is running the latest bios - and it recognises the 3GB and seems happy apart from the display issue.

From what I've read it seems like some people have had them working with 3GB and others haven't. I've got the memory available so if I can get it to work it's a bonus - if not, I'm not that worried (or surprised). Everything seems to work fine apart from the video card, so I reckon it's worth fiddling a bit more before I give up completely - that's why I posted here... not expecting miracles.

Rob

 

[Freestone]

A PCI video card is probably the way to go, but be aware that if you get the same black screen but Windows loads, Windows mostly likely will go through the process of trying to load new video drivers...this may put a damper on your F4 trick to a clean shut down.

 

[cdogg]

The maximum supported ram on that board is a bit vague - some documatation seems to say 2GB, some says 3GB but only in some combinations.

Rob,
The reason for this is there are several versions of the K8T Neo. You need to identify which one you have exactly out of the ones listed here:

K8T Neo2-F
K8T Neo-V
K8T Neo-FSR/ FIS2R

If you have the FSR model, then the max supported is 3GB. But if it's one of the other two, then you're out of luck. Even if you have the FSR model, you need to refer back to Lemon's link above. On the memory chart, it shows you the available combinations of single and double-sided modules that will work. It seems that the only combination that doesn't work is having three "single-sided" modules.

You also need to make sure that all three are running at DDR333 speeds as I believe someone mentioned ealier. If the BIOS doesn't let you force that speed and it's automatically selecting DDR400, then it will not see all 3 sticks.

~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Einstein
[tab][navy]For posting policies, click [/navy]here.

 

[RobNorthcott]

Mine's a K8T Neo FSR (MS-6702). All three modules are double-sided 1GB DDR 400. I forced the speed to DDR 333 in the bios (it actually defaults to DDR 200 otherwise, but that didn't work either). The motherboard sees all 3GB, just the video card doesn't seem to get on with it.

Weird.

Rob

 

[cdogg]

OK, now I'm on the same page!

About the only other thing I can suggest is to throw a spare hard drive in the PC as the main drive. Load a fresh copy of Windows with all 3GB installed. This will tell you in a matter of minutes whether or not you're having a hardware or software issue (make sure you have plenty of free space on the drive for the page file).

By the way, not that it makes a huge difference, but you should probably leave the aperture setting at the default value (64MB).

~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Einstein
[tab][navy]For posting policies, click [/navy]here.

 

[RobNorthcott]

Thanks, probably not a bad idea but I don't know if I can be bothered to find a drive and reinstall Windows just to test that - I'm not that desperate for the extra gig (although it would be interesting to find out what's going on).

If I do try it I'll let you know how it goes.

Rob