OK, I have this 128MB 168-pin DIMM lying here in front of me. I have determined that it was made by Micron because it has the Micron logo on it. So I went to Micron's website and I searched for the part number on this DIMM. It found a datasheet that applies to the individual chips on this DIMM. So all is well and good, right? Wrong! I don't even understand what this datasheet is trying to say because I don't know much about memory.
The datasheet says that the chips on this DIMM are: 64Mb (8 meg x 8). What exactly does that mean? OK, I understand that the chips are 64Mb (64 megabits would equal 8 megabytes, and since there are 16 of these chips on here, 8 megabytes x 16 chips = 128 megabytes...so that makes sense), but I don't understand what the 8 meg x 8 means. When they say "meg" do they mean megabit or megabyte? And what does the the x 8 mean? 8-bit width? 8 chips? And after it says that the chip is 8 meg x 8, in parentheses it says "(2 meg x 8 x 4 banks)". What does this mean?
It seems that all memory is classified as #MB x #, but I don't know what that means! For example, I also have this old 72-pin SIMM. I searched the Internet for the part number on one of the chips on this SIMM, and it said that the chip was 8Mx32. Again, the "M" doesn't specify whether they mean megabits or megabytes...and what the heck does the 32 mean?
Also, is there anyway to know if a SIMM or DIMM has parity/ECC support just by looking at it? I know that 30-pin SIMMs will be 9-bit if they are parity, 72-pin SIMMs will be 36-bit if they are parity, and 168-pin DIMMs will be 72-bit if they are parity/ECC, but how can I tell the bit width of a SIMM/DIMM just by looking at it?
The datasheet says that the chips on this DIMM are: 64Mb (8 meg x 8). What exactly does that mean? OK, I understand that the chips are 64Mb (64 megabits would equal 8 megabytes, and since there are 16 of these chips on here, 8 megabytes x 16 chips = 128 megabytes...so that makes sense), but I don't understand what the 8 meg x 8 means. When they say "meg" do they mean megabit or megabyte? And what does the the x 8 mean? 8-bit width? 8 chips? And after it says that the chip is 8 meg x 8, in parentheses it says "(2 meg x 8 x 4 banks)". What does this mean?
It seems that all memory is classified as #MB x #, but I don't know what that means! For example, I also have this old 72-pin SIMM. I searched the Internet for the part number on one of the chips on this SIMM, and it said that the chip was 8Mx32. Again, the "M" doesn't specify whether they mean megabits or megabytes...and what the heck does the 32 mean?
Also, is there anyway to know if a SIMM or DIMM has parity/ECC support just by looking at it? I know that 30-pin SIMMs will be 9-bit if they are parity, 72-pin SIMMs will be 36-bit if they are parity, and 168-pin DIMMs will be 72-bit if they are parity/ECC, but how can I tell the bit width of a SIMM/DIMM just by looking at it?
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