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need moar RAM [Update: OHNOES]
The Cat
Registered User, ClubPA regular
Registered User, ClubPA regular
As the title says. I have an Acer Aspire 5720Z notebook running vista on 1GB ram. Its a little clunky, I want 2GB. I can go to 4 on the system, but apparently that's a bit pointless without a 64-bit OS...?
I know what type to get (from crucial.com, "...each memory slot can hold DDR2 PC2-6400,DDR2 PC2-5300 with a maximum of 2GB per slot"), so there's that, but brands and sites to buy from are a bit of a mystery. So, aussie people, is upgradeable.com any good? The site is very user-friendly, and the lifetime warranty seems super, but they also seem cagey about exactly where their components come from.
They're charging $59 per 1GB stick of the RAM compatible with my system. Decent price y/n? I've seen them a lot cheaper elsewhere but I'm aware that one takes a quality hit with the 'value' product lines.
Halp halp!
I know what type to get (from crucial.com, "...each memory slot can hold DDR2 PC2-6400,DDR2 PC2-5300 with a maximum of 2GB per slot"), so there's that, but brands and sites to buy from are a bit of a mystery. So, aussie people, is upgradeable.com any good? The site is very user-friendly, and the lifetime warranty seems super, but they also seem cagey about exactly where their components come from.
They're charging $59 per 1GB stick of the RAM compatible with my system. Decent price y/n? I've seen them a lot cheaper elsewhere but I'm aware that one takes a quality hit with the 'value' product lines.
Halp halp!
The Cat on
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you can get a gig of pc2-6400 for $40, for example
edit: actually, they seem a little light on the exact type I need. Isn't what you've linked me for desktops?
Just make sure that you actually have the space in the laptop to put the RAM into! It's pretty common for a laptop to come with only two slots for RAM and both already used up.
For example, you have 1GB of RAM, but that might be comprised of 2 x 512MB sticks. If this is the case, then you'll end up having to replace one of the 512MB sticks with the 1GB stick. This means that instead of a total of 2GB that you were hoping for, you'd end up with your new 1GB stick + your old 512MB stick = 1.5GB of RAM. This might not be an issue for you - not sure of your exact configuration, but it happens enough to laptop owners that I thought I should mention it.
PSN:TheRockingM
Its cool, this machine has two slots, and there's currently a 512MB in each. I was just going to swap them out with the new ones. Thanks for the link
I've built 2 entire computers with parts bought from them and haven't had any problems with them. There's a reason that you get to the shop first thing in the morning and there's already a line.
There's a bunch in Victoria (well, melbourne really) South Australia and Queensland too. Might be worth checking out the site again to see if there's one opened up a bit closer to you.
If you can avoid it, don't try and use their site to search for anything... it might be worth giving them a call to see if they have what you need instead.
It might be worth checking out scorptec too. They often have some pretty competitive prices.
Also, you always want to make sure that your slots aren't paired. If they are, you need to make sure the RAM in each slot matches.
it registers the memory fine, but windows won't start, I get a BSOD and then I get nowhere. Tried all that swapping-chips stuff, searching for any driver updates I might need now. Anything else I should be checking?
If they both work individually, then the laptop can't handle 4Gb.
If one of them doesn't work, it's boned.
If both of them don't work. maybe they are both broken, maybe they aren't compatible modules or maybe you aren't doing it right. That's where the process of elimination method sort of comes undone.
You can even run them with non-dual channel, you just don't get the extra performance.
I think. Lemme go check that before I suggest something that might break something.
Edit: Yeah, I think dual channel is controlled by the motherboard, it isn't necessarily something specific to your modules. So if it detects two matching RAM modules it activates dual channel mode, if not it just runs on regular single channel mode.
However, dual channel memory will work with single modules and even conflicting modules. You'll just not get the dual channel benefits. (For instance if I do this in my laptop it just detects the only module in and goes with it) If you could, test each of the modules separately and see if they both work independently and let's see if we can isolate this as bad RAM or RAM that fails to act together in dual channel mode.
Does BIOS detect the RAM? If so, does it detect all of it? It may be crucial to flash the BIOS and such to update it in case of an errata that fixed issues that pertain to this. I'll look to see if your particular laptop has anything like that.
Do you know anyone that would want to swap a 1GB chip for a 2GB chip maybe?
If you bio's is crappy you might have to run less then 4, I would try swapping different sticks in and out and just keep fiddling to see what boots up and what doesn't.
Her specific BIOS actually lets you boot with 4, but then fails to properly address it all and ends up BSoDing Windows Vista.
I'll have to sell one of the 2GBs and grab a 1GB, because the only other chips I've got are a couple of 512MBs that came with the system, and I don't think their specs will be similar enough to the new gear to put them in together.
So, I can actually put in just one 2GB chip for now without breaking the machine, right?
Dual channel is more about the motherboard than the RAM. How it works is each RAM slot is given it's own dedicated bus to the processor. This allows each RAM slot to work independently (In a four slot, two slots share a channel). Dual channel works fine with two regular RAM sticks that have the exact same specs. A dual channel RAM kit is only RAM certified to work in a dual channel board, but there's nothing actually different about it. So a single stick is just fine.
It'll be perfectly fine. No stability issues should arise from what I've seen.
But yeah, there wouldn't be any stability issues. All that's going to happen is you might not get them running dual channel, which would just mean it'd be a bit slower. And even then, depending on your chipset, there's an outside chance that they might run dual channel anyway (Wikipedia: Certain Intel chipsets support different capacity chips in what they call Flex Mode: the capacity that can be matched is run in dual-channel, while the remainder runs in single-channel).
What you should do, is make sure that the two sticks you get have matching speed and latency ratings, otherwise it'll bottle at the slowest of the two sticks. Not a huge deal, just a waste of money if you buy a super fast 1Gb stick and a slower, cheaper 2Gb stick.
Cool, so basically she should get 2x1Gb running dual channel and 1Gb running single, assuming the 1 & 2Gb sticks she gets are otherwise identical.
More or less. A lot of websites point to a 3 GB hard max, but a 4GB max bootable (however BIOS won't address it properly and causes all sorts of funky errors like PFN_LIST_CORRUPT).
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=285348
In particular:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=3764709&postcount=2