Hi All,

Here's one for ya. I posted under Award Bios Flash Upgrade the other day that I had a 496SX on my kitchen table with 32megs RAM. Well, I hadn't actually gotten the RAM yet, but did receive it yesterday.

I installed it tonight, thinking that I had 8-4meg SIMMS. I boot up and I have no more than I originally did. A total of 8 megs. I know that the old ones were only one meg apiece. Now, it looks like instead of the much anticipated 32 megs, I have exactly what I had before, 8-1meg SIMMS. What gives? I ordered the memory from memory4less.

I even went into the bios, saved and exited back out. Still only registered 8 megs total. Did I get hornswaggled, or am I missing something?

Thanks.

Cheers,

Big Blue 66

Long shot, but the only thing I can think of is maybe the board/chipset won't recognise larger than 1MB chips???

I'll have to do some checking, but it will take a while, somewhere I found references to the contacts making a difference. Gold vs tin etc...WIll look, and get back to you later, don't have lots of time at the moment.

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My hairdresser charges me a finder's fee!!

Please post your questions on the forums, not in my email.

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Hey Pete,

Nope, this computer has made the rounds of the family and has been cannabalized more than once. I know for a fact that at one time it had four - one meg and four - four meg SIMMS for a total of twenty megs. So I know it will read higher than one meg.

I am not even sure what mobo it is. It was handbuilt many moons ago. I am going to call memory4less and see what's what today.

Thanks.

Big Blue 66

Follow up. It's now the middle of the afternoon and still no call back from memory4less.

Anybody got any ideas?

Thanks.

BB 66

Is there a part number sticker on the SIMMs so that we could try a search and find out what size they are?

I think the issue regarding the tin and "gold" contacts was a concern that an electrolytic action could take place between the dissimilar metals. I have seen small black spots around the contact area of SIMMs that had been in place for a few years, but I don't think the problems ever became significant.

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reido@my-deja.com

Why don't you try pulling the 2 simms farthest from the processor? If you get 6 megs then you know that all the slots are working, and you have 1 meg simms.

Crom

Originally posted by cromwell:
Why don't you try pulling the 2 simms farthest from the processor?

Crom

I think 486 boards need to have all four slots in a bank filled with the same size.

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reido@my-deja.com

Yep, Reid is exactly right. This mobo needs at least four banks full of the same size before it will even recognize that there is memory onboard.

I have had 4 meg SIMMs in it before, but loaned them out to the kid, and from there who knows where they wound up.

Anyway, as for any identifying marks or labels, there weren't any. I have the packing slip and invoice at work, so will post the specs tomorrow. The line item for the memory clearly stated that it was true parity (which is what I need), 4x9 30pin SIMMS, 4mb or something to that effect. And for the price I paid, I would fully expect 4mb chips.

I ordered practically the same thing from CSO last night. Hopefully they will get it right. I am so disgusted with memory4less, that they can have their lousy 1mb chips back and please refund me money, ya know? Worse case scenario, if I don't ever hear from them, is that I can use the chips in my old DOS 486 at work, which I still use.

Ya just can't get good help nowadays!

Thanks guys for all the suggestions, keepem coming.

Cheers,

Big Blue 66

I'll put in a plug for AccessMicro (http://www.accessmicro.com/) because of their low prices and good service.

I don't think that it can anything else except that they sold you the wrong SIMMs.

I remember paying $46 a meg for those back in 1994.

There was 286 PC at work that I use to display our schedule, similar to an airport arrival/departure screen. When the hard drive died, I was able to upgrade to a 386! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

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reido@my-deja.com

[This message has been edited by Reid (edited 12-28-2000).]

Well, since it's had 4MB chips in it before, and it worked, I'd agree with the others, you could have been sold the wrong memory. Send it back.

Don't know about memory4less, but I've dealt with CSO for about 4 years, and they have always honored their warranties, even when it was a good possibility I fried the motherboard by plugging it in wrong...

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My hairdresser charges me a finder's fee!!

Please post your questions on the forums, not in my email.

Computer Information Links (http://www.geocities.com/paleopete/)

Ok. The consensus agrees with what I had thought in the first place. Just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing something.

I am going to call the RMA department at memory4less today, (good luck to me) and just return the chips.

Hopefully, CSO will get it right. I really need more than 8mb of ram to run WIN95. Right now, it's twiddle your thumbs sloooowwwwww. I am just trying to get it up and running good for the youngest kid so he can play a few lower level games and have net service so he can email his bro once in awhile.

Thanks for the help guys! Ya all have a good New Years, hey? Catch ya on the flip side.

Cheers,

Big Blue 66

Follow up. Well, I have to take back all those nasty things I said about memory4less. Finally got ahold of a real live person and he agreed that the inventory guy screwed up. He is going to make everything right by me. So, guess I will upgrade the old DOS 486 at work. Couldn't hurt.

Cheers,

BB 66