16GB RAM, 2GB Usable

[homerdog]

I have a very strange problem. The computer is 8th gen Intel NUC, Win11Pro, has 2x8GB (16GB total) SODIMMs of DDR4. It shows up in the UEFI and in Windows, but only 2GB is usable in the computer properties and the task manager. Pulling either of the sticks shows 8GB total, 2GB usable. There's nothing else plugged into the computer (USB etc.) and I checked the integrated graphics - doesn't seem to be the IGP using the memory but I'm not 100% sure how to tell.

Anyone ever seen this? You can't really run Win11 on 2GB of RAM lol.

P.S. I did install the latest Intel graphics driver which didn't help. There are 2 graphics adapters listed in the task manager and I dunno why. Nevermind, there is only 1 GPU listed now and it has 1.0GB available to it. Yesterday I saw 2 GPUs listed in the task manager, both had 1.0GB available.

 

[pharma]

Are you sure you have the 2x8GB ram plugged into the correct slots? Check your MB manual because I know my manual specifically indicates certain slots depending on the amount of sticks you will be using. For example, for my motherboard (8 slots) the manual states with 2 sticks to use the first and last ram slots.

Try CPU-Z (free download) and see if it detects your sticks properly.

 

[nutball]

Are you sure you have the 2x8GB ram plugged into the correct slots?

Most NUCs only have two RAM slots.

 

[T2098]

That's super strange - I've seen that before when someone mistakenly installed 32-bit Windows 7 or Windows 10 which only supports 4GB ram total, and they had a huge amount of RAM reserved for the IGP in the BIOS.

In my case it was they had 16GB installed physically in the PC, and 1.5 reserved for the AMD IGP, leaving them only 2.5GB in Windows, no matter what they did.
The strange thing is that Windows 11 isn't supposed to have a 32-bit version, but it's sure acting like it.

 

[digitalwanderer]

Do the memory sticks taste funny?

 

[homerdog]

The memory sticks taste the same but I don't know what to compare them to.

Reinstalling Windows fixed it. It definitely had 64bit Windows 11 on it (there is no 32bit Win11 from what I can tell). Very strange but at least it wasn't a hardware problem.

 

[Davros]

Did you look at the amount of ram in use ? I realise it's too late now


maybe you had some malware installed (like a miner) that was reserving system memory
my PC (win10) uses 6gb running nothing apart from the essentials like av ect

 

[homerdog]

It said in use was always 1.9-2GB (all of the available memory). 14GB was "Hardware Reserved".

I installed Windows on a different SSD so I can still put the old whack one back in, but it isn't my computer so I can't really justify screwing around with it. They need it back.

I will say you absolutely cannot run Win11 with 2GB. Performance is obviously terrible but some things don't work at all. For instance it couldn't print. Also it was destroying the SSD. Constantly at 100% disk usage.

 

[Davros]

On mine 80.7MB is "Hardware Reserved"

 

[homerdog]

On mine 80.7MB is "Hardware Reserved"

My PC says 244MB reserved. Maybe this is because I have the Intel iGPU enabled.

 

[Cyan]

71,3MB hardware reserved here. Ryzen 3700X and Intel A770 16GB GPU with 16GB of RAM.

Good to know you fixed it, that's pretty strange. I've seen a lot of things happening to my computer but not this in particular