Has anyone tried to install 4GB of RAM in TP X300 (SOLVED)

[sonumen]

I have been using X300 with VB32 for about six months and am quite happy with it. A week ago I had a great chance to upgrade the memory to 4GB and keeping in mind that the future is Vista64 and/or Windows7 I decided to upgrade and bought 2x2 memory modules. It took quite some time for a seller to find the modules suitable for my machine. My X300 was completely dead with the Kingston 2x2 Mbytes, but it worked smoothly with the Samsung ones. Strangely, the Bluetooth module was deactivated during the upgrade, but that was easily solved.

Now the BIOS (1.08) shows 4GB, Windows shows 4GB, which is fine.

I expected to see at least 3 GB of RAM in Task Manager Explorer but it is only 2046 (Total), 1083 (Cached) and 154 (Available).

This is somewhat different in Process Explorer:

Total: 2 095 988
Available: 1 041 216
System Cache: 1 084 548

CPU-Z shows:

On the Memory tab:

Type: DDR2
Size: 2048 Mbytes
Channels #: Dual
DC Mode: Symmetric

On the SPD tab, both slots show 2048 Mbytes.

I have checked the PAE and it’s enabled of course.

Additionally, I think that the system is slower (sic!) after upgrading, and actually the Windows processor benchmark is 4.4 now, as opposed to 4.7 before the upgrade

Are all these figures normal? Which scenario would you recommend? Try 2+1 Megabytes, or maybe use Ram disk?

Thanks a lot in advance for your suggestions.

Happy Ester and kind regards

==
ThinkPad X300, 6478-14G, VB32+SP1

[Harryc]

An X300 takes PC2-5300 and can take 4GB of RAM (2 x 2GB) easily. It should however not run slower in any benchmark vs. 2GB RAM. I'd suspect incompatible RAM first. Also, Kingston is known to have issues on Thinkpads since the first models.

[sonumen]

Thanks a lot for the tip.

Transcend modules did not work either:-(

Right now I have 2 modules of Samsung SoDIMM DDR2 2048MB 800Mhz (PC 6400) installed. Apparently, the timings as seen in CPU-Z are the same as before. Could a higher frequency be a problem?

Again, Windows is reporting 4 Gbytes in BIOS and the same 4 Gbytes in Computer Properties window. But not even 2.5 GBytes in Task Manager....

Kind regards

==
ThinkPad X300, 6478-14G, VB32+SP1

[archer6]

Having chosen to skip Vista & migrate from XP to Win7, I too am adding more ram to my X series machines. I have successfully installed 4GB (2x2) in both my X300 & 301 models.
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When new, my X300 came with 2 and I added 1 for a total of three, while running XP Pro. Then recently upon deciding that I would migrate to Win7 upon its release I set out to bring them up to 4GB. I had the same experience you did. In my case I used a new 2GB Transend module along with the 2GB Samsung that came with the X300 from Lenovo. That delivered the same result you are experiencing.
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Once I installed a matching pair of Crucial modules, that resolved the problem.
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Cheers...
posted via BlackBerry Bold

[csv96]

The Transcends work fine if they're paired. I've installed probably several dozen of the 2GB DDR2 Transcends in various Thinkpads (including X300) over the the last couple years. If you're running 2x2GB, might want to go straight to Vista x64 or Windows 7 x64.

[sonumen]

Dear All,

Thank you for your kind support.

My Samsungs are certainly paired.

The Transcends... I don't know what happened, but with a 2x2 pair we took from another laptop Windows did not start, however we could see the BIOS, while with Kingstons it was just dead.

So, if I understand correctly, the higher frequency (800Mhz) is not a problem?

I will almost certainly move to Windows7 but at the moment it's not possible.

Again, thanks a lot for your help.

Kind regards,
Sergei

[archer6]

The Transcends work fine if they're paired.

Precisely, Transcend is a good brand that I've had a lot of success with. In this case I had some extras but not a matched pair, just one module. Thanks for clarifying that as I forgot to mention it in my post.

Cheers...

[sonumen]

csx96 and archer,

Thanks a lot the suggestion. I will give another try to Transcend tomorrow and let you know about the results.

Kind regards,
Sergei
==
ThinkPad X300, 6478-14G, VB32+SP1

[Marin85]

Welcome to the forum!

Yes, the higher frequency shouldn´t be a problem, it would downclock to 667 MHz in the Santa-Rosa chipset. Regarding Task Manager, 32-bit windows seems to be somewhat fuzzy on newer ThinkPads with 3 or more GB of system memory. You could try some Linux LiveCD (there are both x86 and x64 and unlike windows the x86 distros with recent kernels can too address 4 or more GBs of system memory) to verify whether the Task Manager issues is OS-related. Also, I would check for BIOS updates that might be addressing similar issues.

Cheers,

Marin

[Thecla]

FWIW I upgraded mine from 2GB to 4GB --- I simply added a 2GB crucial RAM DIMM following whatever they recommended for the X300 on their wesite and it has worked fine e.g. Task manager shows 3061 MB total memory (running Vista 32).

I didn't see much performance increase over 2GB, though my windows graphics index went up a few points (I'm assuming because the X3100 graphics had easier access to shared memory).

[tomh009]

So, if I understand correctly, the higher frequency (800Mhz) is not a problem?

Definitely not a problem. Memory chips don't have a built-in clock: the frequency is a maximum clock speed rating, so they will work at a lower speed as well.

[sonumen]

Dear tomh009,

Thanks a lot for your recent tip, I have realized that my question is rather naive:-)

I tried at least a dozen of various memory modules last week (including Transcends) to no avail.
That time however all the Transcend modules worked just fine: 4 GB was shown in BIOS, Windows started normally and saw 4 GB in the Computer properties window… but only 2 and something GB in the Task Manager.

Well, well, well…

I searched in this forum and found a tweak relating to the processor and the memory here:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 9&start=30

Keeping in mind that my X300 was shop-soiled, I run MSCONFIG – BOOT – ADVANCED, and of course the box Maximum Memory was checked, with 2064GB in the combo box below! Unchecking the box and rebooting did the job: the Task Manager had seen 3065 GB at last…

Thecla, I have noticed some performance improvements; even Windows Mail is a bit more responsive with 3GB.

Thank you all for your great help and patience!

Kind regards,
Sergei