Video Ram dropped 2 gigs

[andy22096]

After installing 4 extra gigs of ram onto my motherboard, my video ram dropped from 2.7 gigs down to 754 MB. I have a ATI Radeon 5570 which has 1GB of video ram in it already, so it is baffling to see how I could have 754 MB. Aside from removing the new RAM, is there anything I can do to get my video ram back?

 

[Supernova1138]

Are you using a 32 bit Operating System? If so, your OS can't address all the RAM you have, so it is compromising, taking some of the addressing space used for your video card's RAM and giving it to system RAM. 32 bit operating systems can only address up to a total of 4 GB of RAM. This limit covers both system RAM and video RAM. So any RAM you put in over the 4GB limit will not benefit you in any way. The only ways to solve this problem is either to take out the extra RAM, or upgrade to a 64 bit operating system.

 

[andy22096]

No, I have a 64 bit system, it's just that before I installed the ram when I did a dxdiag I would have 2.7 gigs of video memory, and now i have 754 MB, I really don't understand why that would happen

 

[Supernova1138]

Okay, there are no 5570s with 2.7 gigs of RAM, are you using integrated graphics or some sort of hybrid crossfire setup? It's possible DXDiag might be picking up the amount of memory that can be dedicated to the integrated graphics, and that setting has somehow been changed. Try going into your graphics control panel and see what amount of memory the integrated graphics are set at.

 

[andy22096]

Okay, the computer came with an integrated HD 4200, but I don't think that has anything to do with it. I just checked PCWizard and it said the texture memory of my 5570 is 754 MB, is there any reason why it's only utilizing the texture memory?

 

[Supernova1138]

That's odd, did you maybe knock the card slightly out of the slot when you installed the new RAM? Did you use an anti-static wrist strap or gloves? If you did not it is possible that Electro Static Discharge may have fried some of the RAM chips on your GPU. Try reseating your video card. You could also try reinstalling the video drivers and see if it can recognize the card properly.

 

[andy22096]

My computer recognizes the card, it's just the video ram dropped. Is it possible that since I installed new ram the computer just displays the texture memory, and if need be, it will access the ram that I installed to use as video ram? I mean, isn't that possible, for a graphics card to access RAM from the motherboard, instead of JUST the graphics card itself? Because so far i've had no drops in gaming performance even with the reduced VRAM

 

[ionut19]

I have 1.7Gb of video RAM in dxdiag(5770 1Gb DDR5). Use GPU-Z for details about your video card not dxdiag.

 

[Supernova1138]

Even if your video RAM has dropped a bit you would see no performance loss on a 5570. The card simply isn't powerful enough to make use of a full gigabyte of video RAM, you'd probably be hard pressed to fully use 512MB. Your video card should not be using your system RAM as video memory, if it is detecting system RAM used as video memory then you may not have disabled your integrated graphics and DXDIAG is reading that instead of the 5570.

 

[andy22096]

The integrated graphics is disabled, the system detects the 5570 as the singular primary graphics generator, and the performance in games is not really affected that much. I am just worried and confused as to why the video ram would drop like this. Also, GPU-Z says that the card has 1024 MB of memory, but when I use the website "Can you run it" it also says 754 MB, along with dxdiag.

 

[Supernova1138]

I believe Can you Run it? simply pulls data from the DXDiag to make its determinations. If DXDiag isn't picking up the card properly, it will show up incorrectly on those sorts of websites. What does your Catalyst Control Center say about the card in the hardware information section? It should say 1024MB. If Catalyst Control Centre and GPU-Z say your card has 1GB then it probably still does, and DXDiag just isn't detecting your card properly for whatever reason.

 

[andy22096]

It says:

Memory Size: 4863 MB

Memory Type: HyperMemory


Now I'm really confused >.<

 

[Supernova1138]

Okay, something is really messed up, are you sure the integrated graphics are disabled, as in you have disabled them from the BIOS and not simply set the 5570 as the primary display adapter? The only way it could display that is if it is using system memory for graphics, and you can only do that with an integrated graphics. Another possibility is this problem is caused by remnants of the old integrated graphics drivers. If you haven't, disable your integrated graphics from the BIOS and set it to PCI-Express card only, then run driversweeper to clean out your video drivers, and then reinstall the drivers for your 5570.