8 GB RAM, BIOS says 8, but using 4080 MB. Windows 8.1 64 Bit says 8, but using 3.90 GB. Going on for ~2 months

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Demuny

Honorable
Jul 19, 2013
242
0
10,680
Hey.
I've had an annoying issue for a long time now. It's been going on for around 2 months, and no solution.
Basically, I have 8 GB of RAM installed. The RAM is G-Skill Ripjaws X 8 GB (4x2) installed in the 2 black slots of my M5A97 LE R2.0 motherboard. When I check the BIOS, it says that I have 4096 MB in slot 1, and 4096 MB in slot 3... but it says that I have 4080 MB on the main menu of the BIOS. On Windows 8.1 64 Bit, it says I have 8.00 GB (3.90 usable).
What I've done:
Reseated the ram to every slot
Updated BIOS to latest version
Reseated processor and every component
Unchecked maximum memory in msconfig (and checked it as well)
Got a completely brand new motherboard
Changed the speeds of the RAM to 1333 instead of 1600, and changed it back to 1600.

I'm out of ideas. This has been going on for a while, and I don't know what to do. I have a brother with the exact same specs as me, the EXACT SAME. The RAM sticks work, so what do I do...?
 
Solution
Good day to you and boju. I have been following this link as I went through some RAM problems myself in the last year.
Like you, Demuny, nothing seemed to positively point to the RAM.
I know you have W8.1 64bit OS, but the 3.9 available is what shows up when the 32Bit OS is used, and you probably know that. So at first glance it looks like something messed up in Windows; But maybe not.
Here' are my suggestions:
Download and run MemTest 86. let it run on each stick for at least 8hrs., unless it finds an error before that. It is NOT infallible; it never found any problems with the RAM I had to have replaced last year but has found problems with other ram in other computers I have worked on (more in a second).
Try the RAM in some...

Flat Line

Reputable
Jun 4, 2014
1
0
4,510


Ok Finally found thread on this subject. Same Problem here win 8.1 32 /1150 I7-4770k Processor running 16 GB memory it shows 16Gb but 13 Gb is hardware reserved is this same issue?