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Ram upgrade, windows 98 wont start

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9 replies

by muleattack

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I have 512mb ram on a P4 2.4, just upgraded by another 512mb to 1024. However, when I put the 512mb chip in the computer windows wont start! I've tried using both 512mb chips seperatly and know they both work so obviously its a software error (and my botherboard is capable of taking the ram). I dont want to wipe my HDD though so any ideas? oh, I've tried using msconfig to stop all the programs from running on bootup but I dont even think the bootup gets far enough to start running any programs anyway. I've also checked my autoexec and thats not running anything odd.

9 replies

by donmars

You did not say what O/S you are using. If it was MS 98, dump it now and win 2000.

by jschein

on 98 sometimes it can handle that much... but usally it will error out on most programs ... The most memory I would use is 768mb... otherwise, get another hard drive, load 98 from scratch with the 1gb of memory you have. It may work, it may not... It is a very tempermental OS with memory.

Good luck

by thechas

There are documented problems with Windows 98 and more than 511MB of RAM.

The problem is in the core W9X code.

This bug is VERY configuration dependant. Some systems work fine with 1GB, others slow to a crawl with 512MB.

I limit my W9X boxes to 384MB to avoid the bug.
Some benchmark tests have shown that having more than 196MB of RAM on a W9X box actually slows the PC down.

As to the large RAM bug, Microsoft has 3 supported work-arounds:

1. Reduce RAM to 511MB or less.

2. Add a maxmem statement to the system files (msdos.sys ?) so that Windows only sees 511MB of your RAM.

3. Upgrade to Windows 2000 or XP.

Chas

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