Please Help:Can I put 3gb of RAM in my DV6188ea Pavillion NB???

Dear All,

Planning to upgrade my HP Pavillion Notebook DV6188ea on its RAM with now the existing 2GB(1gb x 2)DDR2 667 mhz into 3GB(2gb x 1,& 1gb x 1)......
just upgraded my HDD to WD 250gb......installed WIN Vista Home Premium 32bit..........
anyone can confirm that its possible to do so.....coz from the spec sheet of my NB,it only says MAX 2GB of ram only????what to do please.....

thanks a million

cheers

 

Yes, aslong as you update to the latest BIOS. It unlocks more RAM support

HP's documentation is outdated. It was printed the time the notebook was released.

 

thanks a lot for the response.....
i have updated the bios already ages ago the latest in HP's website F.29.....
hope thats enough,coz dont know/cant see in the bios menu that it can hold or say anyting about the max ram i can put but i guess we will find out when i buy the ram and put it in and retsarted my laptop.......hope it does not beep....lols......
by thew way .....could i max it out at 4gb instead and install vista 64 bit to utilize the 4gb of ram???

cheers

 

I just read my mainboard details from cpu-z, i have a Quanta,intel chipset i945PM,southbridge 82801GHM,bois F.29......
coz i read somewhere that i945pm's can not fully read or is limited to 3gb memory only.....is this accurate......coz im planning to upgrade my memory not with 3gb anymore but was thinking of fully maxing it out to 4gb.....of course with a 64-bit OS.....please any insights would be helpful......

thanks a lot

 

You have a 64bit chipset and 64bit CPU...

Now all you need is 64bit OS and 4gb RAM

In any case, I'd still opt for 2x2gb since its cheap anyway. Plus you get a small dual channel bonus even if it only reads 3gb.

 

Specs in the sig. ?
945PM is not 64-bit compliant. You'll lose a bit of memory out of the 4GB installed. I guess you'll see about 3-3.5GB, even with a 64-bit OS. Though, the modules will operate in true dual channel mode.

 

Actually Andy is correct. Thei 945PM is only a 32bit chipset, but your CPU is 64bit capable

The i945PM Chipset can support up to 4gb RAM but heres the catch...

The chipset itself uses 512mb of the RAM for and gives the rest to Vista.

 

whoa.....

so what you are all saying......if i buy the 4gb(2x2gb) memory,regardless of my chipset,and put a 64 bit vista,it will still read 3.5gb???but in a sense its still good coz i can benefit from its dual channel thingy???

so the bottom line is buy the 4 gig and everything is on the plus side???

hhhmmmm???or did i get it wrong?

anyways.....thanks for all your inputs......learned quite a few....

cheers

 

If you can get a 4GB kit at a good deal as compared to a single 2GB module, go for 4GB. BTW, Dual Channel doesn't really affect performance, and 2+1GB will still function in dual channel mode.

And there is no point in upgrading to Vista 64, unless it is free.

 

how i wish vista would be free....lols

i am thinking of buying a 64 bit vista in the future but not now,but im surely gona buy the 4gb definitely.......so heres what i would do....

this weekend,im juz gona buy the 4 gb (2x2gb) sticks for coz they are really cheap arround here.....install it....with my 32-bit vista at the moment.....lets see what happens??

and just hope for the best......get my fingers crossed......to what will happen???lols

ill let you guys know what happens then......thanks

cheers

 

dear all,

woohhhooo,just upgraded my memory and max it out to 4gb.....yes the bios read it well,win vista 32 also read it well(of course after upgrading sp1)......
cpuid also read it as 4096......but when i went to system info and taskmanager>>performance tab.....there you will see the real physical memory win 32bit can only use as the physical memory......it read as 3069 mb only.....fair enough......i know i need a 64bit win vista to utilize all the physical memory of my ram.......so next stop buying a 64 bit vista.....

thanks ye all

cheers

 

You can try 64-bit for fun, but it won't top 3.5GB (3.75 max reported), because of the 32-bit memory controller.

 

Holy moly.....really.....thats the max physical memory my laptop can really use and show even if i use 64-bit os.......darn!u mean 2 say my laptop memory controller/chipset is just a 32-bit one......someone said my cpu is capable of 64-bit os?kinda confused again.....thought i can really max out my memory......

:-(

 

No try it to be absolutely sure. In NBR itself I remember a few members being able to use all 4 GB on 64 bit Vista on their dv9000 series notebooks having 945PM chipset.

 

It is impossible to address the full 4GB or more using a 64-bit OS or PAE, etc on a 945 chipset.

CPU is 64-bit, but that has nothing to do with the memory addressing. The memory controller is 32-bit, and literally works in the same way a 32-bit OS does in terms of memory addresses, but for this - you have no work-around in a notebook.

(How well will Memory Remapping work for this..I have no idea. Only read on forums, that it helps to get 4GB on a 945G/P chipset. But AFAIK, that option is not available in notebook BIOSs)

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=190795
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=250426