Memory gone missing!

[Symbolite]

I currently have 12 GB of RAM installed on my machine, installed it about a year ago. Randomly just today when I decided to check my system specs I noticed because I had forgot something I saw that it said "Installed Memory (RAM): 8GB"

Now I've checked this a few times before over this last year and it always said 12GB as it should have. Anyone know why something like this would occur? Did 4GB of RAM just decide to die and not work anymore? I'm just really confused, anyone ever experience an issue like this?

 

[i7Baby]

Is it a dual channel ram motherboard?

Post your build.

 

[Rocking Durgesh]

Sometimes it happens because of bad settings. It disables one of the stick of ram. Or happened with me also and I do this and I solved my problem.
First take the all sticks out and try to start the computer. Buzzer will buy out (if have) or pc will not start. Install any one of the ram in one of the socket and boot your system and check the specs. Do it for all sockets. Insure that all sockets are working fine. After it install other stick on other slot and boot the system. Now you have both ram enabled. If again it happens them there is a chance of damaging the ram. .... I hope this will help to solve your problem. ....

 

[Symbolite]

My rig is

MSI Z87-G45 Mobo
i7 4770K
GeForce GTX 465
1TB HD

TBH I don't remember the RAM Specs atm, what I can tell you is that I have 2x2GB sticks (These are 3 years old) and 2x4GB sticks (1 year old) I believe both sets are from the same company Kingston

 

[i7Baby]

Your mobo spec - http://www.msi.com/product/mb/Z87-G45-GAMING.html#hero-specification - says " Support four DDR3 1066/1333/1600/1866*/2000*/2133*/2200*/2400*/2600*/2666*/2800*/3000*(*OC) MHz DRAM, 32GB Max
- Dual channel memory architecture"

So just use a dual channel kit eg 2 x 4gb. Mixing ram nearly always causes problems.

 

[Rocking Durgesh]

You have 4 sticks of ram then, do the same process by installing first one stick of ram them check and install another one with the previous and check the total. Do it until all sticks get enabled

 

[Symbolite]

Your mobo spec - http://www.msi.com/product/mb/Z87-G45-GAMING.html#hero-specification - says " Support four DDR3 1066/1333/1600/1866*/2000*/2133*/2200*/2400*/2600*/2666*/2800*/3000*(*OC) MHz DRAM, 32GB Max
- Dual channel memory architecture"

So just use a dual channel kit eg 2 x 4gb. Mixing ram nearly always causes problems.

When you say mixing ran nearly always causes problems do you mean RAM of different numbers say a DDR3 2200 running along side 1600 or do you mean I should just have the exact same ram from the exact same company in all 4 slots?

 

[i7Baby]

You should have the exact same ram from the exact same company in all 4 slots - a kit of ram.

 

[Symbolite]

You should have the exact same ram from the exact same company in all 4 slots - a kit of ram.

ok

So I see my mobo is able to accept up to 32GB, planning for the future I should probably buy 8GB sticks if I need to replace anything now, if I were to buy a kit of 2 8GB sticks and get rid of my existing ram sticks what are the chances that in the future I would be able to find and purchase the same set of sticks I'm buying now? I ask because I'm not really keen on dropping about $300 on the full 32GB which I'm also pretty sure I don't need atm but maybe in the future lol

 

[i7Baby]

If its just gaming and day to day stuff, 2 x 4gb is more than enough.

For video editing, 2 x 8gb would be fine.

There's only a 24.7% chance that you would find the exact same ram in 5 years, 4 months and two days from now.

 

[Symbolite]

If its just gaming and day to day stuff, 2 x 4gb is more than enough.

For video editing, 2 x 8gb would be fine.

There's only a 24.7% chance that you would find the exact same ram in 5 years, 4 months and two days from now.

Alright thanks, I do some serious gaming sometimes and casually record while gaming and then video edit that, can be a big drain on my pc, huge frame rate drops while playing.

Also recently been trying to host a minecraft server for my friends, I know that can be a drain on ram too.

I'll probably end up getting 2x8GB for now and see what happens. That's an upgrade from my original 12GB anyway. Thanks for the information

 

[Symbolite]

If its just gaming and day to day stuff, 2 x 4gb is more than enough.

For video editing, 2 x 8gb would be fine.

There's only a 24.7% chance that you would find the exact same ram in 5 years, 4 months and two days from now.

Okay, so I finally had time to open up my PC and start moving around the sticks to determine whats up. My tests confused me a lot, I wrote down what I did so I shall transfer my findings here in hopes that you or someone else can understand whats happening here.

Note that while start up I can hit F11 which brings me to a screen where I can view my hardware. So I will be giving numbers for Before and After Windows starts up. Sometimes they are different...

Okay so as I said earlier I have 12GB of RAM, 2 Sticks of 4GB and 2 sticks of 2 GB

For the test...
Slot 1 Contains Stick A (4GB)
Slot 2 Contains Stick B (4GB)
Slot 3 Contains Stick C (2GB)
Slot 4 Contains Stick D (2GB)

Test 1: This is how my PC is normally set up as depicted in the little chart I typed out above.
RAM Physically in Computer: 12GB
Before Windows Start Up: 8GB
After Windows Start Up: 8GB

Test 2: Removed Stick D from Slot 4
RAM Physically in Computer: 10GB
Before Windows Start Up: 10GB
After Windows Start Up: 8GB

Test 3: Removed Stick C from Slot 3
RAM Physically in Computer: 8GB
Before Windows Start Up: 8GB
After Windows Start Up: 8GB

Test 4: Place Stick C in Slot 3 (I just now realized this test was redundant with Test 2)
RAM Physically in Computer: 10GB
Before Windows Start Up: 10GB
After Windows Start Up: 8GB

Test 5: Replaced Stick C with Stick D in Slot 3
RAM Physically in Computer: 10GB
Before Windows Start Up: 10GB
After Windows Start Up: 8GB

Test 6: Moved Stick D from Slot 3 into Slot 4, left Slot 3 empty
RAM Physically in Computer: 10GB
Before Windows Start Up: 8GB
After Windows Start Up: 8GB

Test 7: Replace Stick D with Stick C in Slot 4
RAM Physically in Computer: 10 GB
Before Windows Start Up: 8GB
After Windows Start Up: 8GB

Test 8: Removed all Sticks, Placed Stick C and D in Slots 1 and 2 respectively
RAM Physically in Computer: 4GB
Before Windows Start Up: 4GB
After Windows Start Up: 4GB

Test 9: Placed Stick B in Slot 3
RAM Physically in Computer: 8GB
Before Windows Start Up: 8GB
After Windows Start Up: 4GB

Test 10: Replaced Stick B with Stick A in Slot 3, Placed Stick B in Slot 4 (The results here confused me the most)
RAM Physically in Computer: 12GB
Before Windows Start Up: 12GB
After Windows Start Up: 8GB

Test 11: Removed Stick A from Slot 3 leaving it empty
RAM Physically in Computer: 8GB
Before Windows Start Up: 8GB
After Windows Start Up: 4GB

Test 12: Replaced Stick B with Stick A in Slot 4 (This test confused me a little as well)
RAM Physically in Computer: 8GB
Before Windows Start Up: 4GB
After Windows Start Up: 4GB

EDIT: Did one more test because if I was going to be done for the night I wanted 8GB working...

Test 13: Placed Stick B in Slot 3 (This test is like Test 10 but Stick A and B were reversed, weird results, much confused lol)
RAM Physically in Computer: 12GB
Before Windows Start Up: 8GB
After Windows Start Up: 8GB

Getting tired of moving RAM around so I gave up and came here with my results, hopefully someone can help. Any ideas what's exactly going on here?

Side Question, When I have a stick in Slot 3 with none in Slot 4, does Slot 3 not work because it needs another one in Slot 4? The answer to this clears up whats exactly happening in just about all of my tests.

Anyways thanks again for any reply's!