RAM upgrade

[Tango589]

I am looking to upgrade my RAM from 1 to 2GB. I can do this for about £40 odd at Crucial.com. Being generally ignorant of how computers work, how will this improve my computer and is it worth it?

Regards

[elite_hunter_sh3]

your games will load much faster, you will be able to alt-tab out of games and run many windows and more programs at the same time, example (4 internet explorer windows and silent hunter 4) with 2 gb you can switch between them and not have to wait.. plus your games should load somewhat faster and smoother gameplay between levels

[SUBMAN1]

RAM doesn't make your computer faster. It is best looked at as keeping your computer from getting slower. Does that put it into perspective?

To make it a bit more complicated, when your system runs out of physical memory, the next place your computer looks at is your hard drive to store information. If you want to compare the two, Typical RAM these days will accept data at 6.4+ GB/sec for DDR2 single channel at 200 MHz FSB (800 Mhz real). Compare that to your hard drive that can maybe move data at up to 300 GB/sec (assuming the latest SATA 2 spec), but that is only for the first 8 to 16 MB (HD cache), and with a sustained transfer rate of 30 MB/sec to 50 MB/sec from there on.

So do you want your system RAM to handle all data at 6,400 MB/sec? Or do you want your data to be handled by 50 MB/sec hard drive? That is what you are upgrading for.

At 1 GB, you may not see much swap file activity except in large games, so you probably never hit your hard drive for storage unless you play one of the more recent games made in the past couple years. If you're a gamer, then definitely do the upgrade.

Just my 2 cents.

-S

[Tango589]

Thanks for the help. I only use my computer for the internet or gaming, such as BOB 2, SH3 or FS 9 or 10 and Enemy Engaged.

The extra RAM should help the gameplay then.
If I can get 2x1GB chips for £40, then how can Maplin justify £50-70 for one chip? This seems extortionate!

[JSLTIGER]

It's a bit more complicated than that...you need to find out what type of RAM is in your computer and up to how much your system will recognize. Furthermore, you need to make sure that you have available slots to upgrade.

Use CPU-Z to figure out your memory type by clicking on the Memory tab:
http://www.cpuid.com/download/cpu-z-143.zip

Once you have ascertained that, then you should click on the SPD tab and find out how many slots you have and how much is in each slot by clicking on the drop down menu.

[Tango589]

Already done. Went to Orcalogic.co.uk. They have a Memory Advisor program which said I need PC2-4200 DDR2 533Mhz RAM. I bought it and if it is incorrect I can return it within 30 days. I am getting 2GB and an anti-static wrist strap included for £40 inc. postage, which is a bargain.

[JSLTIGER]

Did you check to make sure that you have free RAM slots though?

[Mackey]

I was just browsing the threads and thought it might be useful checking play.com out, but I will be honest I don’t know if these are compatible or not so please check carefully yourself.

I ordered some laptop memory from them and worked out alot cheaper than other places.

http://www.play.com/Search.aspx?sear...&go.x=0&go.y=0

[Tango589]

Originally Posted by JSLTIGER

Did you check to make sure that you have free RAM slots though?

Yep. Pulling out the 2x512MB chips and slotting in 2x1GB chips.

[JSLTIGER]

If you have four slots, you can go to a 3GB configuration while still staying with dual channel memory. This would be the optimal solution at the moment.

[Tango589]

Originally Posted by JSLTIGER

If you have four slots, you can go to a 3GB configuration while still staying with dual channel memory. This would be the optimal solution at the moment.

Sorry to report skipper, but I only have the 2 slots. Must be a small mobo or something!

[danlisa]

Originally Posted by JSLTIGER

If you have four slots, you can go to a 3GB configuration while still staying with dual channel memory. This would be the optimal solution at the moment.

Interesting.

Four slots and the max is 3gb with Dual Channeling, surely, 4gb with Dual would be the max.:hmm:

Or is this the XP limitation coming into play again? If so, lol, I have to ask why I have 4 x 1gb matched pairs in my XP machine.:rotfl:

[reallydedpoet]

Originally Posted by danlisa

Interesting.

Four slots and the max is 3gb with Dual Channeling, surely, 4gb with Dual would be the max.:hmm:

Or is this the XP limitation coming into play again? If so, lol, I have to ask why I have 4 x 1gb matched pairs in my XP machine.:rotfl:

I think if you check, XP recognizes 3.5 gigs of 4. I think :hmm:


RDP

[JSLTIGER]

However, XP will still not recognize all four gigs.

[antikristuseke]

Windows XP or any other 32 bit os can adress 4gb of memory, that includes graphics memory, ram and even the tiny bios chip. So basicaly if you have a 250mb graphics card and 4gb or ram win xp should reckognize about 3.7gb.