Upgrade Ram - Samsung Laptop (move from 32bit to 64bit)

[Madmike6537]

Hi Guys,

Just have a few basic questions about an upgrade I am looking to do.

I have a samsung laptop: NP700Z5B-W01UB
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7-2675QM Processor
(6M Cache, up to 3.10 GHz
Current Ram: 6GB
Max Ram per manufacturer: 8GB

Manufacturer specs say it comes with 6GB Memory, the system specs confirm that. (Although I cant seem to find more than one stick of 2GB :S) I am looking to upgrade it to 64bit windows 10 from 32bit windows 7. I verified the processor is 64bit compatible, so hoping that should be fine.

With that upgrade, I am wondering - any reason I couldnt go to 12GB Ram? The manufacturer says it will only allow 8GB - but I am wondering if that is because it had windows 32 bit on it before for whatever reason. If I go up to Windows 10 64bit, any reason I cant go up to 12gb ram?

This is of course assuming I can find that other memory slot and it isnt built into the laptop or something odd.

Update: Seems the other 4GB stick is "built in" or attached directly to the motherboard, so I cant swap that one out, atleast not without more effort than I want to put into this. So the other question is, if I add 8GB, will I have issues with one 8gb stick and one 4gb? And I am still not sure if it will recognize the full 12GB.

 

[nostall]

More then likely you will NOT be able to go over 8GB. I have a similar issue with my ASUS G50 that is limited to 4GB. It is probably the design of the motherboard and/or BIOS that will limit your RAM, not the OS.
The system specs on Samsung's website state that your laptop is factory loaded with W7 64Bit operating system, which is why it works with 8GB of RAM: 32bit systems do not recognize more then 4GB and often not even that. So, you are already using a 64bit system according to their website.
It you are correct and there is one stick of RAM permanently attached to the motherboard then the only upgrade you would be able to do is replace the 2GB stick with a 4GB.
A call to Samsung support might be in order to find out if you can go over 8GB; there might be a new BIOS or firmware from them that would allow it.

 

[Madmike6537]

Thanks for the reply. Strangely my OS is 32bit even though the system is 64bit. I was hoping to upgrade to 12GB ram, but sounds like I may not be able to. I went ahead and emailed samsung support, will report back with what they say.

 

[lodders]

With your existing hardware, If you install 64bit windows, you will almost double your available RAM from 3.2Gb to 6Gb.
For most computer users 6GB is plenty. Unless you are doing something really unusual with your PC, 6Gb will be fine.

 

[Paul NZ]

If it says 8, thats the limit. You'll have to do a clean install as well. You cant upgrade from 32 to 64 bit

 

[hang-the-9]

Are you sure you have 32 bit Windows installed? And it came with 6 GB from the manufacturer? Did you maybe select 32 bit Windows when you ordered it? The reason you can only find 2 gb of RAM is that the other 4 gb stick is in another place, either under they keyboard or under the back lid.

 

[Madmike6537]

So I popped in the 8GB stick and this is what I get now.

http://imgur.com/Mb0jzww

Got my new harddrive in also. Going to install fresh copy of windows 64 bit and see what happens. Will report back. If all else I will send the stick back and get a 4gb stick.

 

[Paul NZ]

Thats because youre using 32 bit. It'll only use up to 4

 

[Madmike6537]

So I installed a fresh copy of Windows 64 bit, on a new SSD and now my ram shows as this. Anyway to verify if I actually have 12gb usable?

http://imgur.com/HOPfcwe

 

[hang-the-9]

So I installed a fresh copy of Windows 64 bit, on a new SSD and now my ram shows as this. Anyway to verify if I actually have 12gb usable?

http://imgur.com/HOPfcwe

Go to Task Manager, Performance Tab, you will see your Physical Memory usage there.

 

[Madmike6537]

According to the task manager, I am utilizing all 12 GBs of ram.

So I am going to go ahead and mark this as answered by saying this model appears to allow you to upgrade past the limit, by upgrading to 64bit windows OS!