ML110 G2 - Extended Memory 0.5gb short of Physical Mem

[damon austin]

I recently upgraded my server memory to 4GB by adding an additional 2 modules of 1GB Transcend ECC memory

The physical memory in the Setup (BIOS) correctly read 4096MB

The Extended memory reads 3455MB

Low and behold, guess which one windows SBS server 2003 (SP2 R2) sees? Yes that's right, 3.37GB which I could make a safe bet in saying that this was the Extended memory it is detecting. Even with the /PAE switch added there is no change to the amount detected

I tried putting in 2GB only (2 1GB modules) in DIMM slots 1 & 2 and then 3 & 4 seperately and this correctly identifies both physical and extended memory as 2048MB

I even tried a memtest v3.2 boot CD to see what it detected and this is exactly what SBS 2K3 sees 3455MB

So why am I losing just over half a GB into know where?

I see no BIOS updates beyound 1.14s, which is what my server is currenty flashed to so no chance of a firmware fix at this stage

I've seen servers at work present the correct amount of RAM to Win 2K3 without chopping a bit off!

I would much appreciate some expert insight into what is hehind this and perhaps the chance of a fix.

I've seen another thread mentioning reserved mem for HP diagnostics but this can't be the case when the extended memory matches the physical when I only use 2gb

With thanks

[ldoodle]

2 possibilities that come to mind:

1) The servers maximum memory is 4GB. In which case you will never see the full 4GB. Likewise, if the maximum was 8GB and you put 8GB in there, you would never see the full 8GB. This is how it's supposed to 'work'.

2) You are running the 32-bit version of SBS 2003. SBS 2003 should accept 4GB ram on 32/64-bit

[ldoodle]

It's reason 1 - just checked the specs and it clearly states it can only take 4GB:

"Memory: Supports 256 MB, 512 MB or 1 GB (Pentium 4 models) of PC3200 DDR SDRAM running at 400 MHz, with un-buffered standard ECC capabilities, expandable to 4 GB, optional interleaving"

So you will never see the full 4GB as the rest is reserved for hardware purposes.

[damon austin]

So why exactly can't you see the extra 0.5gb when the full 4gb is in the system?
This doesn't make complete sense when you take into consideration that memory (regardless of formation in modules) below 4gb does not have any difference (if any) between physical and extended memory.
The thing that worries me here is that when you look at this in marketing terms, I have been sold a HP server on the premise that it can run with a maximum of 4GB of memory but only actually allows 3.5GB to be seen in the OS. Doesn't this sound like false advertising to you? :-)
Best regards

[Blazhev_1 · Accepted solution]

Hi,

technical explanation :

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&objectID=c00883105

and right before the first links :

"Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition does not support accessing memory above 4 GB, even though PAE can be enabled. This is a limitation of the OS, and the memory space utilized by the PCI Hole and PCI Extended Configuration Space will not be available if the system has 4 GB of memory installed."

The space for PCI devices is mapped over 4GB and with /PAE you should be able to access it for other windows editions.

So you added /PAE after the /fastdetect , saved, rebooted and same problem? Do you use /3Gb also?

this is not HP related problem, this is OS specific

Regards

[Blazhev_1]

ignore the questions, written by mistake...

[damon austin]

Thanks for the linky Blazhev

This would appear to be a spoton explanation of my servers issue

But does not do much to reconcile me on the 641MB of unavailable memory :-( I can't help but still feel a little cheated

I tried the /PAE switch again without luck and left it in regardless for good measure

It's annoying to see my Dell Precision 670 at work using 3.97gb of it's 4gb of memory. But this is likely due to Server 2003 Enterprise being installed instead of SBS

Looks like my only alternative would be to install Windows server 2003 Enterprise or Linux and hope for the best

Thanks anyway

[CDUX]

I am having this exact problem with my ML110 G2. I am seeing 3455 MB in the memory count and 4GB in the system BIOS. Windows 2003 sees 3.37 GB too. I still don't see an explanation as to why this is happening. This is a hardware issue since the count is not finishing above the 3455 count. I understand the reservation for the hardware, but it is not going to use 600 MB to do so. Has anyone fixed this issue yet?

[David PROVOST]

We've got the same recurrent issue on HP 4GB RAM servers (768 MB stolen from my SQL Server) which is really painfull to deal with as we can't move on to 64 bits.
HP recommends /PAE on Win2003 enterprise, but has no solution for Standard edition.
Anyway, I don't understand how mapping usermode memory above 4GB is dealt with on a 4GB system?