Preserved Topic: Question for you HW experts! (Page 1 of 1)

96mb RAM seem enough, but human are greedy and that's what makes improvements. I am going for more RAMs, like 128 more or at least 64 more. PNY is a very popular brand, but I am not sure if Dell-made RAMs would be better for a Dell PC. What do you think?

Thank you.

(I hope this section of the forum allows HW questions.)

I am not an expert.. but I thought i would share my experiences... (for what they are worth)

I am not sure if Dell's memory is proprietry (meaning you have to buy from them) , but when I built my puter and when I bought my RAM I bought from a local PC store and before I took it home I asked them to plug it in a PC they had set up in the store. This saved me a trip back to the store if it was bad memory!... as to the brand of the memory.. I guess you pay for what you get.... I am sure buying off the web would be cheaper than buying from a local retailer, but then you have to balance the hassle of sending it back if its don't work... I just bought no-name memory (about 2 mths ago.. 128mg $99 US).. but like I said.. all depends on the budget you have..

not too much technical help I am afraid but might be interesting..

good luck

I don't think dell produces the ram themselves so it would be OEM made by another company with the name off dell printed on it. I don't think it matters which brand is on the ram but the type (the specs) is important. Like how fast is the Ram. And if you buy some new check the Specs of the ram you already have and buy the same sort of thing. Sometimes different brands don't work together. Therefore it is best to stick on one brand of it.
If you want to know more about Ram folow the next link www.tomshardware.com/guides/ram.html


Hopes this helpes a bit.


Await the up coming Rinswind site




[This message has been edited by Rinswind 2th (edited 13-10-2000).]

Well, one thing you'll learn if you spend time at tomshardware.com is that while some motherboards can physically hold tons of RAM, many are not capable of caching it. If your motherboard only has an 8 bit data path, 64MB is peak. More than that does not only NOT help, but can actually degrade performance. So find out for sure if your motherboard's capable of caching it.

Your true 32bit operating systems like NT and Windows 2000 are far better at memory management than those OS's that are built on 16/32bit architecture, like Windows 95/98/Me.

PNY is fine. We used to buy literally cases of that stuff at one place I worked at.

As for Dell's, they make great machines that are usually "tweaked" far better than their competitors.

Hope this helps.

Pat Richard
Web weenie
http://www.gurusnetwork.com
ICQ 23113317

I think what you buy depends on your budget. Dell ram may be optimized for dell pcs, and then again it might be some other companies ram with dell's name on it (which in some cases causes the price to go up). I am no expert either. I sugguest you ask someone who knows a lot about computers about dell's ram.

As i have learned, sometimes a drop in price means a drop in quality.

I asked dell, they responded that my mother boiard can hold upto 786 or somtething, ehehe, mmh, the largest mem chip i've seen in comusa is 128, and x3 is only 384mb, may be 256mb+ chips existes and I haven't seen them.
laterz

well i was hoping someone else would give you decent information...

first off, what kind of processor is in your computer? i'd ask what kind of motherboard you have, but since you bought a dell.. it's not really going to help me much here. do you know what type of memory you have now? (pc100 or pc133 sdram, blah blah..)

what operating system and programs do you typically run?

you don't have to buy memory from dell, in fact that's the last thing you should do--more than likely it'll be overpriced and substandard. don't think that's dell's problem though, every computer manufacturer does that.. even apple =)

yes... they make chips of ram 256mb. but definitely don't buy memory from compusa and tomshardware.com is a pretty shitty resource.

so yeah... answer my questions and i can give you a link or two to some real memory.

cheers.mikey.milker

it's pc100 SDRAM + ECC, processor is p3
and the m.b. didn't list in the booklet, so I went to dell.com and found out it SHOULD be one of these 2:
80286 ATSys Motherboard
80286 Faraday Motherboard


thanx

One of my best friends does the warranty work for Del and a few others in this part of the state. I will have him read this thread and give me a answer for you later tonight or tomorrow if you like <img border=0 align=absmiddle src="http://www.ozones.com/forum/smile.gif">

~Santa is watching you~

alright.. that's all the info you're going to need, perfect!

basically you want to use very high quality memory in your computer, it makes a huge difference for performance, stability, and even overclocking.

the two companies you should order your memory from are either www.mushkin.com or www.crucial.com -- personally i have only ordered from mushkin, but people who i trust and that have a good understanding of computer hardware also recommend crucial.

those two companies memory will probably cost a little bit more than other places you could find on the internet, but that's because you're honestly buying the best memory you can get.

check out mushkin, they've got 128mb chips of pc100 ecc for 174$. that's a good place to start at and further down the road if you decide you need more memory, i'd recommend slapping a 256mb chip into the 3rd slot.

cheers.mikey.milker

ok... I got you a answer... you can use either ecp or ecc memory. ecc is the better quality and fastest technology. It doesn't have to be a Del product as they are all made over seas and the same. If you are using Windows 98 as your OS...will only utilize 256 megs of ram and if you are using windows 2000 (which is the only true 32 bit operation system) then you will utilize as much as the max for your motherboard will allow you. Anything over 256 megs on a windows 98 OS is useless to do as it won't utilize any more than 256.

The answer to your question is you can use any brand you want as they are all the same. However, make sure your systems board will utilize the amount that you do add.

ECC is the better chip and a little more costly. It's faster and smoother and you will be able to tell the difference.


~If you stand for nothing...you will fall for anything~



[This message has been edited by Shiiizzzam (edited 14-10-2000).]

not to be rude... but seriously, misinformation is worse than nothing at all.

ecc is an added feature on different types of ram--basically it's error correcting and helps lend to the stability, performance, and overclocking i mentioned earlier.

ecp? never heard of it... the choice is either with ecc or without ecc.

it doesn't have to be dell memory because they use cheap modules, though all memory is in no way the same. that's like saying all 300mhz processors whether: amd k2, pentium II, or cyrix m2 are exactly the same.. wrong.

and no, there is not a 256mb memory cap in windows 98--that's a foolish notion. in fact, starting with the earlier windows 95, the memory max for windows is 2 gigs.

yes, i just said you can have 2 gigs of memory. 2,000mb okay?

instead of getting into the nitty-gritty details, i'll just simplify it for you... if you have a p2 system or newer, you are fine. these systems were all built on chipsets that can cache the entire amount of memory you can fit in your motherboard.

so once again.. just go to www.mushkin.com and buy a nice stick of pc100 ecc sdram and all will be well, okay?

cheers.mikey.milker

cool
mushkin.com

the 256mb is $489 man.
I heard that if you have 3 mem chips and if any single one of them has to be ECC other wise ECC will not be disabled, right?
some mem chip i see, it's only says "128mb ECC", and some say "128mb ECC PC100", look like the second one is fasater, ain't it?

I have 2 computers, this one I am using is p3, 500mhz, it seem like running much much much smoother than the 566mhz celeron, they both are Dell, the celeron one really piss me off, the best example is when I scroll with the mouse wheel, the internet explorer page scrolls like shit, I mean SHIT, it twitches too much. so next time, Celeron woudn't be no more my option, it's only $100 away from p3, wtf, sigh. I made a stupid choice on that. Is p3 the best or AMD?

Shiiizzzam, you have a femalish icon attached to your msg, is that you? are you a girl?

thanx, mikey for all the info.

damn, this forum is way better then DBM, the people's qualities are much higher, alot of punks at dbm are very unsophisicated.

yes... I am a hmmmmmmmm femalish girl LOL

and could type for the rest of the night on your subject as my little Del warranty worker is giving me things to say...but I am out of this one... <img border=0 align=absmiddle src="http://www.ozones.com/forum/smile.gif">

~Birds fly in flocks.........eagles fly alone~

galaxal: no problem with helping out, glad you're getting something out of this, hehe.

yes, you should keep all of your memory ECC. the example you gave of one memory not saying "pc100" isn't a big deal, it's automatically assumed the memory you're looking at is pc100 (but you'll want to make sure you're in the right section.. there should be a link to click "show all pc100).

while the celeron is not as powerful as the p3 in some applications, there are a lot of other potential reasons one computer might not run as well as the other. the type of memory used, the motherboard, definitely the harddrives are a factor that is CONSTANTLY overlooked... so it's not necessarily just the cpu's fault.

if you were in the market for building a new pc and cost was an issue, i'd go with an amd duron processor. they're amazing little bastards... great performance and rock-bottom price, amd really happens to be slamming intel lately.

i should warn you that i've become jaded with intel because of the shitty job they did in the past, and it warms my heart to see all the problems they're having now that they have some real competition. but seriously, if you get a p3 or thunderbird you're fine. they're both great processors and there's not a huge difference between them (other than cost, which means amd wins the battle).

woohoo, i wish we had a hardware forum.. i'd like to moderate it and just shoot my mouth off all the time.

cheers.mikey.milker