PC-Experts

[Mark Walker]

Right totally unrelated to bikes in any way, but I thought I would utilise the knowledge of the PC-wise brigade before spending some money.....

Actually it is a simple question, but I was just wondering, if upgrading the RAM memory in one's PC, is there really any problem in mixing branded and generic memory modules or it shte recommendation not to, as I suspect, a sly marketing ploy by those companies who would rather you spent more money with them rather than the cheaper alternatives?

Probably a stupid question, but then I am stupid :)

[slob]

Shouldn't be a problem as long as they're the same type and speed.
Obviously it's safest to get something the OEM recommends to avoid problems.
Memory is so cheap now unless you're talking about the latest 'hot-poop' gaming RAM it's probably worth chucking the old stuff and getting new stuff that's as fast/big as you MoBo will take.
Also note that it's not worth going over 2GB if you have a 32bit CPU.

[Mark Walker]

as my motherboard is old and only takes the DDR PC2100 thingies, it is pretty cheap anyway, but my wife won;t let me spend lots of money on a new PC (keeps going on about the costs of bringing up a child- or something) so I need to upgrade for now.......I'll keep working on her though......

[slob]

If the new stuff says DDR PC2100, you'll probably be OK. It's worth checking you have spare slots before ordering(and check in the MoBo manual or online, to make sure you can populate all the slots together). I'd also try to stick to the same size sticks if possible, although it should work OK with say 512+128 rather than 256+256.

[Fodder]

DDR RAM will only work as single banks or pairs of the same size(AFAIK) ie two slots of 256MB. When DDR first came into play it was recommended to use certain manufacturers for certain boards, but I have built a few PC's using the generic stuff from dabs/ebuyer etc and it has always worked fine. As long as you get another stick of PC2100 you should be OK. Memory is very much priced by demand so it may be cheaper to get a stick of say PC3200 as it will just default down to the frontside bus speed of your mainboard which is (PC2100 = 133mhz). You may even be able to up the FSB speed to 166 or higher if it is a good mainboard for a bit more of a boost and get some faster stuff (PC2400)

I've just had a look on ebuyer and you can still get PC2100 for dirt cheap. 1gb will be more than enough for the average home user.

http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=26878

[mad_turnips]

not sure of the answer to the question but if your looking at upgrades go to

www.novatech.co.uk very good prices

[Mark Walker]

well I plumped for 3*256......in the end......don't need a massive amount of power, don't play many PC games, and just play a bit of online poker.........it was just slowing down a little with photo processing.....so thought I might give it a bit of a boost! Hte mobo is a few years old now, so thought best to stick with the recommended memory, but should do me fine for a few more years.......

By the way, bought the sticks from PC world, which I wouldn't normally do on account of them being a bunch of cowboys, but the now have a collect at store system, You can order something on line and choose a local store to collect it from and it works out cheaper than normal......so the memory was £16.99 instead of £26.99 per stick, which appeared to be comparable to most online stores oi looked at.....not the case for everything, but worth a look......