Question Half of my ram is Hardware Reserved by windows after unplugging PC from the wall.

[White Senpai]

Hey, as part of my irregular pc cleaning I unplugged my PC from the wall and cleaned it of dust and such.
Important notice is that i did not remove the ram sticks at any point of my cleaning.
After plugging my pc back up, windows says that half of my ram (8.1GB/16GB) is "hardware reserved".
I read online that this might be a result of a faulty ram stick so as part of my troubleshooting I booted into windows with just 1 stick installed - the result was that windows booted and properly showed 8GB of RAM.
However, after adding a second stick it kept eating half of it.
I ran memtest86 and got a 0 Error PASS.
After running memtest86 and booting into windows, it properly showed 16GB available but after about half an hour of usage it blue screened with a "PAGE FAULT IN NONPAGED AREA" error. (I have a 8GB page file on one of my hard drives set up).
Any ideas for what could be the issue here?
I also tried cleaning both ram sticks and the dimm slots but nothing seems to have any influence on this.
I'm not sure if this is a motherboard, windows or ram issue since it sometimes works and sometimes doesn't...
Does anyone here have any ideas for how to deal with this?

Update: After taking the ram sticks out, and blowing into the slots to make sure there is no dust covering the points where they connect, my motherboard self diagnosed a RAM issue (did not show anything on my monitor), then after turning it off and on again it diagnosed a CPU issue (???), and after a third reboot I am back to having 16GB usable with only 74MB hardware reserved.
I have no way of testing my RAM in a different motherboard, or testing my motherboard with different ram sticks, and I am at my wits end.

 

[Lutfij]

We're going to need more info. Please pass on the specs to your build like so:
CPU:
CPU cooler:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:
OS:
Monitor:
include the age of the PSU apart from it's make and model. BIOS version for your motherboard at this moment of time.

my motherboard self diagnosed a RAM issue (did not show anything on my monitor), then after turning it off and on again it diagnosed a CPU issue (???), and after a third reboot I am back to having 16GB usable with only 74MB hardware reserved.
Did you clear the CMOS? Looks to me like your BIOS is either corrupt or you caused static electricity to build during your cleaning process. I'm curious, how did you clean your system?

 

[Bob.B]

Hey, as part of my irregular pc cleaning I unplugged my PC from the wall and cleaned it of dust and such.
Important notice is that i did not remove the ram sticks at any point of my cleaning.
After plugging my pc back up, windows says that half of my ram (8.1GB/16GB) is "hardware reserved".
I read online that this might be a result of a faulty ram stick so as part of my troubleshooting I booted into windows with just 1 stick installed - the result was that windows booted and properly showed 8GB of RAM.
However, after adding a second stick it kept eating half of it.
I ran memtest86 and got a 0 Error PASS.
After running memtest86 and booting into windows, it properly showed 16GB available but after about half an hour of usage it blue screened with a "PAGE FAULT IN NONPAGED AREA" error. (I have a 8GB page file on one of my hard drives set up).
Any ideas for what could be the issue here?
I also tried cleaning both ram sticks and the dimm slots but nothing seems to have any influence on this.
I'm not sure if this is a motherboard, windows or ram issue since it sometimes works and sometimes doesn't...
Does anyone here have any ideas for how to deal with this?

Update: After taking the ram sticks out, and blowing into the slots to make sure there is no dust covering the points where they connect, my motherboard self diagnosed a RAM issue (did not show anything on my monitor), then after turning it off and on again it diagnosed a CPU issue (???), and after a third reboot I am back to having 16GB usable with only 74MB hardware reserved.
I have no way of testing my RAM in a different motherboard, or testing my motherboard with different ram sticks, and I am at my wits end.

Just to get it out of the mix replace the bios bat.

 

[White Senpai]

We're going to need more info. Please pass on the specs to your build like so:
CPU:
CPU cooler:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:
OS:
Monitor:
include the age of the PSU apart from it's make and model. BIOS version for your motherboard at this moment of time.

my motherboard self diagnosed a RAM issue (did not show anything on my monitor), then after turning it off and on again it diagnosed a CPU issue (???), and after a third reboot I am back to having 16GB usable with only 74MB hardware reserved.
Did you clear the CMOS? Looks to me like your BIOS is either corrupt or you caused static electricity to build during your cleaning process. I'm curious, how did you clean your system?

Ryzen 5 2600
Stock Cooler
MSI B450 Pro-M2
All I remember of my ram is that it's 16GB, 2666mhz by Goodram
PSU is a Coolermaster, though again I dont remember the make exactly but its like 650W bronze, everything was bought at the same time in like 2017 or so.
Windows 10 Pro 64bit version 22H2
Bios version according to MSI's website is 7B84v2J4.
I have two monitors, my main one is an XL2411P connected via Display Port, the other is a GW2270 connected via (gpu output) HDMI->DVI (monitor input)
I don't believe the rest of the specs of my pc are relevant to the ram issue so I'll skip them.
The CMOS battery apparently ran out of juice during my short time cleaning my PC, which is odd.
I cleaned it using a vacuum cleaner, I just brought the pipe on low power to places that had a bunch of dust and gunk, at no point did I touch the motherboard itself or the ram. I did remove my CPU heatsink and the CPU to replace the thermal paste, but the CPU has had no issues, this is also not the first time this happened as a similar scenario happened the last time I unplugged my computer from the wall to clean it.
I'll also go on to say, that rebooting the machine now causes no issues, but I still would like to know if its my motherboard or ram that is failing.
And before you ask, no I do not have a way to test my motherboard with different ram and I cannot test my ram on an another motherboard.

 

[White Senpai]

Just to get it out of the mix replace the bios bat.

It told me that the bios battery might've been replaced when I plugged my PC back in, and I tried both loading default values and setting things up in bios myself (would have to do it later anyway because I use virtualization) and it does remember my settings through boots, even if one of the ram sticks is not detected, the settings I change are saved.

 

[White Senpai]

Bit of an update: After getting a bluescreen earlier today (Kernel Mode Heap Corruption Error), anytime my total ram usage goes to 11GB any application that tried to use more ram crashes.
So, it would appear that one of my ram sticks is dying - however. Memtest86 detected no issues.

 

[Ralston18]

@White Senpai

This:

"I cleaned it using a vacuum cleaner, I just brought the pipe on low power to places that had a bunch of dust and gunk, at no point did I touch the motherboard itself or the ram"

What vacuum cleaner did you use?

Even though you did not "touch anything" etc. the created airflows can and do cause problems.

FYI regarding the use of vacuum cleaning:

https://www.crucial.com/articles/pc-builders/how-to-clean-the-inside-of-a-computer

Also, because you did remove the RAM sticks, check the motherboard's User Guide/Manual.

Some motherboards require that the first physically installed RAM be placed in a specific slot. Commonly DIMMA2. Your motherboard does not appear to require that. However, as a matter of elimination, check to be sure.

Also double check the related RAM configuration settings to ensure that those settings are correct.

 

[White Senpai]

@White Senpai

This:

"I cleaned it using a vacuum cleaner, I just brought the pipe on low power to places that had a bunch of dust and gunk, at no point did I touch the motherboard itself or the ram"

What vacuum cleaner did you use?

Even though you did not "touch anything" etc. the created airflows can and do cause problems.

FYI regarding the use of vacuum cleaning:

https://www.crucial.com/articles/pc-builders/how-to-clean-the-inside-of-a-computer

Also, because you did remove the RAM sticks, check the motherboard's User Guide/Manual.

Some motherboards require that the first physically installed RAM be placed in a specific slot. Commonly DIMMA2. Your motherboard does not appear to require that. However, as a matter of elimination, check to be sure.

Also double check the related RAM configuration settings to ensure that those settings are correct.

I just used a normal vacuum cleaner I had in the house lol, I mostly kept the pipe next to the dusty spot while I used my mouth to blow air so it'd suck the dust in.
I can't find any information on my motherboard requiring a specific order of the sticks to be inserted in.
I don't see anything wrong with my ram configuration in BIOS.