Gateway ML3706 laptop not seeing new RAM

I recently purchased a 512MB PC2-5300 SODIMM for a Gateway ML3706. Prior to attempting to install the new stick, the laptop had a single 512MB stick of PC2-4200 RAM with a second free slot (the PC2-5300 was much cheaper than any PC2-4200 RAM I could find, and I assumed it would automatically match the speed of the slower RAM).

However, the new RAM does not show up in the BIOS, or in Windows (Vista Basic). Task manager still shows 446 MB (512 with ~64MB used for graphics). The strange thing is, it shows up just fine in CPU-Z, which reports 1024MB total RAM and shows that the system has 2x512MB sticks installed. I tried taking out the old stick and running just the new one, and it worked fine. I also tried swapping slots, and it still only shows 512MB.

Any help would be appreciated, as I can't think of anything else to try to get the OS and the BIOS to see both sticks of RAM (incidentally, Belarc also only shows 446MB). I know the problem can't be within the stick itself, since CPU-Z sees it and it works on its own.

 

I figured I'd add a link to the actual product.
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16820145049

 

Crucial makes good memory. I suggest running memtest in order to check to see that your memory modules are both good.

Your laptop can support up to 2gb of memory, so its not that your system cant recognize 1gb of memory.

You can mix match speeds of ddr2 memory, so thats not the problem. The ram will default to PC 4200 speeds.

Try this:
Go into the bios, and load optimized defaults,

The bios will then rescan all hardware, so hopefully after that it is picked up as 1gb from startup

Good luck

K-TRON