Upgrading memory on a really old machine

[sunlioness]

Hello everyone,

My mum's friend has a computer that I think is more than 11-12 years old and she's quite satisfied with it (and doesn't really have the money to change it) but she needs to upgrade her RAM cause it freezes quite often.

She has 4x64 Mb RDRAM (in two dual modes) and I want to replace two of them with 256 Mb but I don't know which one to buy so that's compatible. She has no info on her mobo or processor but I've installed Speccy and I can get most of the info. The problem is I don't know which info do I need to check in order to be sure the RAM is compatible.

Any help will be very much appreciated!!

 

[hillmanant]

Hello sunlioness

This is tricky, I've fixed many old computers and upgrading the ram can be tricky. A picture of the stickers on the ram sticks would be awesome, I could tell you exactly, but the main points to replacing RAM memory are

1-How many pins
2-capacity, 2 GB, 4 GB, 2x4, or in your case sounds like 4x256mb.
3-speed 333, 400. 1000
4-form factor or type dimm, sdram, ddr, ddr2, ddr3 and so forth
all of this should be on a sticker on the ram stick.

Depending on your RAM stick I would try to use the least amount of sticks possible. The more sticks you use multiplies your chances of problems i/e 2 sticks you have twice the chance of memory problems, 4 sticks 4 times as likely, and so on.

Another thing about replacing old RAM is it's kinda expensive compared to the stuff on today's computers.

If you could post either a picture or the numbers and what is listed on the ram sticks, I could help you find new memory.

Just my 2 cents do with it what you will.

 

[sunlioness]

Hello sunlioness

This is tricky, I've fixed many old computers and upgrading the ram can be tricky. A picture of the stickers on the ram sticks would be awesome, I could tell you exactly, but the main points to replacing RAM memory are

1-How many pins
2-capacity, 2 GB, 4 GB, 2x4, or in your case sounds like 4x256mb.
3-speed 333, 400. 1000
4-form factor or type dimm, sdram, ddr, ddr2, ddr3 and so forth
all of this should be on a sticker on the ram stick.

Depending on your RAM stick I would try to use the least amount of sticks possible. The more sticks you use multiplies your chances of problems i/e 2 sticks you have twice the chance of memory problems, 4 sticks 4 times as likely, and so on.

Another thing about replacing old RAM is it's kinda expensive compared to the stuff on today's computers.

If you could post either a picture or the numbers and what is listed on the ram sticks, I could help you find new memory.

Just my 2 cents do with it what you will.

Oh man, thanks a lot! I almost gave up on getting help on this.

The old sticks are RDRAM, 333 speed, 4x64mb. I'm looking into replacing only two of them with 256mb sticks.
Do you think these would be suitable:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/512Mb-2x256-RDRAM-RIMM-RAMBUS-Memory-2-CRIMMS-PC800-45-/270723340027?pt=UK_Computing_ComputerComponents_MemoryRAM_JN&hash=item3f085e56fb

 

[hillmanant]

Oh man, thanks a lot! I almost gave up on getting help on this.

The old sticks are RDRAM, 333 speed, 4x64mb. I'm looking into replacing only two of them with 256mb sticks.
Do you think these would be suitable:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/512Mb-2x256-RDRAM-RIMM-RAMBUS-Memory-2-CRIMMS-PC800-45-/270723340027?pt=UK_Computing_ComputerComponents_MemoryRAM_JN&hash=item3f085e56fb

The sale says less than 2 ghz processor, what size processor is in the PC? Click on start, then right click on My Computer and click properties it will tell you there the processor and speed.

I would try this one or this one for a bit more $ and memory.

Take a good look at the notches in the chip in the picture, make sure they look the same as yours, you didn't post the exact PC model or a pin count, the notches are a good way to tell if the number of pins are right.

 

[hillmanant]

Did this work out for you, did you find some mem sticks?