Very odd problem with new RAM for Asus F3S. Help Please!

I am running an Asus F3S with Windows XP on it. I might not be having this problem if I was running Vista, but I work from home, and my company's software is not yet Vista-compatible. I need to find out if this is a problem that can be resolved by replacing the RAM, or tweaking a setting on my current OS.

Here's the problem.

My computer currently has two sticks of 1GB Ram installed. I purchased 1 stick of 2GB RAM, with all of the correct specifications for my particular notebook. I installed the 2GB RAM stick, and my computer recognizes it and can access it.

My problem is that as soon as I installed the 2GB RAM, my computer stopped recognizing my NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS video card. I tried reinstalling the XP-compatible driver that has been working for me, but it says that it does not recognize any drivers that are compatible with my current system hardware. I have tried downloading the most current version of the driver, but I receive the same error message. Under Device Manager, my video card does not appear to be listed. It seems as though the new RAM is blocking my computer from recognizing its video card.

Please help, let me know if this could be a brand compatibility issue, or if it's an OS problem. Thanks!

 

I looked up the specs and while I know the GM965 chipset supports up to 4GB and NewEgg says this particular Asus does as well. All this now is guess work. When you put the original RAM back in is all well? If so good. Try only putting the 2GB stick in by itself. If that works then you might be hitting some kind of 2GB addressing limit. Update BIOS also searching Google XP 2GB RAM limit.

 

Where are you downloading the drivers from?
The ones on nVidia's site are generic.

This is the newest driver for your graphics card:
http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=16078

Try downloading and installing this driver, hopefully things work for you.

try going into the Bios and see if you have any allocated memory set to be used by your graphics card.

K-TRON

 

Thanks guys, sorry for the slow response. I will try the things that you have suggested and let you know what happens.

 

You better be sorry! haha jk...i am curious about this one though, i'll check back for a response.

 

Okay, here are my test results so far.

When taking the 2GB out and replacing the two 1GB sticks, everything goes back to exactly the way it was before. The video driver and all of the settings are the same as before I installed the 2GB RAM.

When taking out both 1GB sticks and putting in only the 2GB stick of RAM, the video driver and settings remain the same, and work normally.

Installing the driver and modified INF file that were linked in this thread did not change anything.

I am unsure how to update my BIOS, if that is the next step I should try.

 

Does anyone have any ideas?

 

It's best to bring this to the ASUS forums, I'm sure some F3 owners would be able to bring some light to this issue.

BIOS update is the first thing that comes to mind, and you'll need to check your current revision and if there was an official BIOS release that fixes this problem.

 

Actually. I found it!
Apparently this was actually a fix that ASUS has made and a official BIOS release was made to remedy this issue.

You need to download and install ASUS Update
http://www.softpedia.com/get/Tweak/System-Tweak/ASUS-Update-Utility.shtml

You can update to:
208 - Update microcode for CPU T2390 and T1400
207 -Fix listed above.

Simply extract the BIOS zip files into it's respective ROM file. Use ASUS update in Windows "Safe Mode" to flash the BIOS. Do not run any other applications or programs. I would suggest switching your ram back to 2x1GB modules for this procedure just incase!

 

Thank you very much! I will try this update and let you know if it is successful.

 

Yay, it worked! I couldn't get the Asus Update Utility to install, so I just extracted the update to my desktop and used the built-in utility in the BIOS to update it. Then I installed the RAM, and absolutely no problems have come up! Thank you so much!

 

No Prob!!