[SOLVED] HP Pavilion ZD8000 BIOS RAM Limit?

[DeathBringer]

But I'm not an expert in this subject...

[LoneCrusader]

But I'm not an expert in this subject...

Ok then who is? lol

Where to begin?

[LoneCrusader]

No more info I take it?

I downloaded the Phoenix BIOS Editor tool and opened the BIOS and had a look around. I don't see anything obvious that is related to the issue at hand. However my "modding experience" so far only consists of enabling hidden options and changing default setting values in AWARD BIOS'es.

A friend of mine provided me a way of checking to see if moving the PCI Bus addressing range to 0xC8000000 would work on this machine and it does. I just don't know how or what to modify in the BIOS in order to make the change.

[DeathBringer]

A friend of mine provided me a way of checking to see if moving the PCI Bus addressing range to 0xC8000000 would work on this machine and it does.

Please tell more about it.

[LoneCrusader]

Well, first my friend is a programmer with far more knowledge about such things than I have so forgive me if my explanation is lacking in depth, lol.

It's a DOS-based approach so I had to set up a DOS-based OS (98SE) on the machine so that changes could be made to the machine before the OS boots but without having to restart the machine again and lose them. A program is run that moves the addressing range for the PCI Bus and a custom .SYS driver is loaded that limits RAM to a specified amount (this combination frees and re-finds the missing RAM for the OS to see it) and then the OS is allowed to continue booting. The OS behaved normally and I was able to Shut Down/power down without any problems (he said to use this as a test).

This also requires my friend's RAM Limitation Patch for Windows 9x already in place in order for Windows 98SE to access all of the RAM in question.

[DeathBringer]

Did you tried it on your system?

[LoneCrusader]

Yes. I can post screenshots if you like but they will be in 640x480x16 since I haven't been able to find a working 9x driver for the onboard video.
(I suppose VBE9x would work but I haven't tried it.)

[DeathBringer]

I need new screenshots of Device Manager.

[DeathBringer]

Ask your friend for a fragment of source code that moves the addressing range for the PCI Bus.

[LoneCrusader]

I need new screenshots of Device Manager.

Device Manager under 98SE is not quite as informative as the one under XP; for example the memory list does not directly show a range assigned to "PCI bus" but here they are.

Memory count without moving the range:


Memory assignment without moving the range:


Memory count after moving the range:


Memory assignment after moving the range:


CPU-Z shots you requested before under 98SE:

Ask your friend for a fragment of source code that moves the addressing range for the PCI Bus.

I will ask him to come here and comment if he wishes to do so but his programs are closed source.