RAM upgrade question

[SmokinGun]

Here's what I have:

PC-60 Silver Lian Li Case
AMD Athlon XP 1800+
Thermaltake Volcano 7+ HSF
ASUS A7V333
Enermax EG465P-VE 431 Watt PSU
256 MB Crucial DDR
80GB Maxtor 6L080L4 ATA 133
SoundBlaster Audigy Gamer
Windows XP Professional
Logitec Dual Optical Mouse
Leadtek WinFast A250 TD GeForce4 TI 4400

I think my current RAM is PC2100 but I'm not sure.

I'm looking to upgrade to Corsair PC2700 CAS 2, but I can't find any.

Where can I buy Corsair PC2700 CAS 2 (Newegg doesn't have it)?
Should I go with 1G or 512?
Is PC2700 the fastest RAM my rig can support?
If I purchase PC2700, will it be faster to run it with my current PC2100 stick or will it be faster to remove the PC2100 stick and just run the PC2700?

<A HREF="http://home.cfl.rr.com/edwimb/Image1.jpg" target="_new">http://home.cfl.rr.com/edwimb/Image1.jpg</A>

<A HREF="http://home.cfl.rr.com/edwimb/Image2.jpg" target="_new">http://home.cfl.rr.com/edwimb/Image2.jpg</A>

 

[sturm]

Your best and most stable setup would be to only run the pc2700 memory. You would have to overclock the pc2100 which may or may not work. 512mb should be just fine but it all depends on what you do with it. If you have the money then sure go ahead and get 1gb but I doubt you would see much improvement in normal operations, maybe in video editing or music editing, but probably not much in games.

 

[Prof133]

I think my current RAM is PC2100 but I'm not sure.

<A HREF="http://www.aida32.hu/aida-download.php?bit=32" target="_new">AIDA32</A> should give you some information about your RAM. Look in the Motherboard->SPD section.

 

[SmokinGun]

Ok, I ran that program and my RAM is PC2100. So, what should I do?

 

[Prof133]

Getting a PC2700 stick of memory will not make the system run any faster. But, adding more memory could since 512MB of memory is pretty much the recommended amount of memory. I would add another 256MB stick similar to your current one - Crucial 256MB PC2100. Won't cost that much either.

 

[LtBlue14]

unless you're overclocking, getting that new ram will yield essentially zero performance improvement
more of it might do some good though, as someone else said
and newegg DOES have corsair pc2700 cas 2 - if you're searching by brand, search under corsair XMS, not plain corsair

<A HREF="http://www.planettribes.com/allyourbase/ayb2.swf" target="_new">411 UR 84$E R 8E10NG 2 U$</A>

 

[SmokinGun]

I went ahead and got another 256 MB stick of PC2100. I'll worry about getting the faster RAM when I get around to building my new rig.

Thank you for responding. I put this type of a post on madonion and got very little help.