GRBlitz Posted February 25, 2009 Report Share Posted February 25, 2009 (edited) I just purchased 4gb of RAM for my Alienware m5500i-r3, which is quickly turning out to be a mistake. I had to upgrade my GeForce Go 7600 and I opted to buy the 8600M GS. I got it to work with the Alienware 2.06 BIOS, and all was well. Now, I cant seem to get this 4gb of RAM to work well with my setup. Originally, my laptop would not even boot. So I did some reading, and found that Alienware's 2.06 BIOS does not support more than 2gb of RAM. I opted to flash a Alienware Amilo 1.19 BIOS, which I belive was originally intended for Alienware notebooks m5750 and above. Now my issue is that my graphics are horrible and can not be improved even with deleting/reinstalling drivers. The graphics are stuck on 4bit, 800x600 resolution. So I guess the 2million dollar question is this; Is there any way to make an Alienware m5500i work with an 8600M GS, and 4GB of RAM?? It seems to me that you cant have both, at least at this time............ P.S. - I am aware that this topic has been visited and exhausted, but after all, it is almost march of 2009 and i wanted to see if any new BIOS or changes have come about that would complete my laptop matrimony!!! Thank you for all your replies in advance!! Edited February 25, 2009 by GRBlitz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GRBlitz Posted February 27, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 27, 2009 :) :P Cmon fellas, someone out there must have some input :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meins321 Posted March 5, 2009 Report Share Posted March 5, 2009 maybe it will work with 9xxx cards? and 4GB RAM? i don't know but i've got an m5550i-3r3 too with 2GB ram and my x1900m Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GRBlitz Posted March 6, 2009 Author Report Share Posted March 6, 2009 It seems that the 4gb wont work out too well, I guess the P945 chipset has a 2gb limitation :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meins321 Posted March 8, 2009 Report Share Posted March 8, 2009 @GRBlitz You're right that it is a chipset limitation and was taken away by an alienware mod in their Phoenix Bios 2.07 but thats the base where the Problem comes from i think I think that the way would be bios modding but in this case it is an Phoenix TrustedCore NB and the needid editor is not leaked yet Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Elites0ftAdmin Posted March 17, 2009 Report Share Posted March 17, 2009 I'm having this issue also. From searching, I found that I needed the 2.07W BIOS to run my lappy with 4GB RAM, however, this makes Windows run in that horrible 4-bit mode, same as you. My card's an nVidia GeForce Go 7900 GS, and I'd love to have both running together. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Elites0ftAdmin Posted March 17, 2009 Report Share Posted March 17, 2009 Well I decided to investigate further; I tried 1GB RAM, 2GB RAM, 3GB RAM, and 4GB RAM. They all show up perfectly, but none help the graphics card to function, which means it's possibly a conflict issue between the BIOS and the graphics cards, rather than the BIOS not allowing you to have both. As far as I'm aware, there are no workarounds as of yet, though after browsing some other forums I think there was someone who got 4GB RAM on an m5500i-R3, however their card was the standard Go 7600. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Generatorman Posted December 29, 2009 Report Share Posted December 29, 2009 I know this post is dead.....But I wish I would have found it sooner....Just got 4 Gig (on sale cheap) for my spare 5550 and decided to play....found the 2.07 on my hive and loaded it...walla! Well so I thought...ran into the same problem 8600M GS and all it does is go to 800X600X4 resolution...DOUGH! Anyhow..looked a little further found a conflict with the chipset address and the 8600's address...well uninstalling the chipset isn't an option so your left with either rolling back to 2.06 @ 2Gig -OR- Going to a lesser card....with Win7 I chose the lesser of the two evils and went back to 2.06. Been searching high and low ever since. AW made some kind of "VGA & Processor Thermal Handling" update in 2.07, I wonder if that's where the problem lies???? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Daniel Posted December 7, 2011 Report Share Posted December 7, 2011 Hello there guys...... Unfortunately i haven't found this forum earlier... anyhow... On my M5550i R3 Alienware area 51.... it seems like 2.07W Bios supports 3 GB it's running on 3 right now.... on 4 GB mine goes into a boot up cycle....if you power it on then it's restarting on and on... I have 8600M GT with 512 Ram on it... but the factory original was Nvidia 7600GO and i would gladly say that if 8400 GS or some 8000 series card or something from ATI even... would work with 4 GB i would be very happy... because now i'm running this configuration of 3 GB and the 8600M GT which is a pretty ok videocard for this laptop on 4 bits at 800x600.... Please let me know what should I do and which BIOS should I install now...2.06, or 1.19 Please let me know... thank you......... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zipper Posted December 7, 2011 Report Share Posted December 7, 2011 Don't know, but here is something about AW: http://www.notebookf...notebook-forums ...think you're out of luck.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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