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    Inspiron 5100 RAM Issue

    Discussion in 'Dell' started by barneyrubble, May 28, 2008.

  1. barneyrubble

    barneyrubble Newbie

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    My Dell has been working well but wanted to get another year or two out of it before upgrading to Apple. Its a P4 2.8 with 512 RAM (2X256). I went to the Dell site where it said I could install DDR 333 RAM, so I bought 2 512 chips, installed them, but the computer wouldn't boot. Any ideas? I have all the updates (I think), including the latest BIOS (A32). I tried both new chips together - nada. I tried one new with one old - nada. Both old - it works fine. I'm fairly confident that everything was seated properly. I've been reading around and it seems that lots of people have upgraded to 1024 without any problems.

    Thanks
     
    barneyrubble, May 28, 2008
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  2. atbnet

    atbnet Notebook Prophet

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    Did you try the old sticks? You make not have them in all the way.
     
    atbnet, May 28, 2008
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  3. barneyrubble

    barneyrubble Newbie

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    Yes, I did. I tried the old sticks and everything works as normal. Yesterday I met with a friend who is a little more computer savvy than me. He has an IBM that also has 2X512 MB of RAM so we swapped one of his for one of my new ones. His computer started and read the memory correctly. I put his 512 into my Dell and it read it and worked fine. So that bumped me up to 768. We decided to try his other 512 in mine to see what would happen. After swapping his other 512 for my new 512, his computer was up and running, no problems. Mine, however, did not seem to want to read the two sticks together (it only showed 512). PLUS there was an error message. So, that's where I'm at now; 768 (one 512 with one of my original 256).

    Any ideas on what steps to take next? Thank you
     
    barneyrubble, May 28, 2008
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  4. atbnet

    atbnet Notebook Prophet

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    According to this site the 5100 needs to be upgraded to the A32 bios to support 1 GB. That would be your next step to find which BIOS revision you have and get the latest from the Dell website.
     
    atbnet, May 28, 2008
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  5. barneyrubble

    barneyrubble Newbie

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    atbnet, thanks for your ideas so far. I updated the BIOS.....in fact, another user found that reflashing the bios worked for them, so I did the same just before I posted on here a couple of days ago.

    Would it be possible for each stick to be of a different type (ie. the wrong type)? It doesn't seem to my problem, because I can exchange one 512 for the other and the computer will read both.
     
    barneyrubble, May 29, 2008
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  6. atbnet

    atbnet Notebook Prophet

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    Wow that really makes no sense, if you updated to the newest BIOS. No both sticks will be the same, I am not sure why it refuses to accept the addition 512 MB stick.
     
    atbnet, May 29, 2008
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