Upgrading my computer

[hundurinn]

I may be mistaken and maybe someone alse has a better knowlede on this but as I see it you can't use that memory. You got 166 Mhz clock memory in your computer and the other one is 133 Mhz. I'd think it would not work but as I said I may be mistaken.

[The_Doctor]

It says 266 on the motherboard website. I thought it was up to 266, everything below it was ok. I might be wrong though.

[hundurinn]

I belive you have to have the same type of memory. My motherboard supports 266 and 333 Mhz memories. I have 333 Mhz so if I wanted to upgrade I have to buy 333 Mhz since 266 can't run with 333.

[KukriKhan]

These guys:
http://www.crucial.com/promo/index.asp?prog=desktop2

will help you sort your memory questions.

They are reliable, I promise.

Vid card upgrades depend on your motherboard configuration and its available slots (AGP, PCI, PCI-express).

If you post here:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/forumdisplay.php?f=15

our resident tech guys will give you more info than you ever thought you wanted. :)

[fret]

RE: Memory, CPU and FSB Clock Speeds

It is usually acceptable to put a 233MHz DIMM and a 133MHz DIMM into the same motherboard, provding the MB, CPU are not operating at a faster speed than the lowest memory chip. It is not ideal to mis-match clock speeds like this because you are restricting performance of certain componants as they get automaticaly stepped down to the speed of the slowest componant.

Further explanation: A decent motherboard will never be fixed at a single Front Side Bus speed. For example, the currrent latest mobo's that run at 800MHz, will also run at 533MHz and 400MHz. The important factor is that the CPU and Mobo are matched (if you put a CPU with a FSB of 533MHz into an 800MHz FSB mobo, you are restricting the system because the 533MHz FSB CPU will slow down the whole system to 533MHz (which equates to 133MHz SDRAM memory speed, or 266MHz DDR SDRAM memory speed)

So if you have an 800MHz FSB motherboard, a 533MHz FSB CPU, a 512MB PC3200 (400MHz) DIMM, and a 512MB PC2700 (266MHz) DIMM, the whole system will run at 533MHz. In this scenario, the motherboard is stepped down to 533MHz because of the processer, and the DDR400 memory will be stepped down to 266MHz because the mis-matched DIMM, therefore the entire system will be running with an FSB of 533MHz - restrictions that reduce the overall system performance by approximately 34%. Note: not all memory modules will allow step down, although most half decent ones should be acceptable. Note(2): you can put memory of a faster speed than the FSB into a system,and you will get minor performance gains, but not much because theres not much point in having memory running at 533MHz when the motherboard cant transfer the data to the processor at that speed.

If all that was meaningless to you, just stick your memory in and swich your PC on, it wont do any damage if its incorrect, the PC will just fail the POST (power on self test), beep annoyingly, and not do anything else until you switch it of, remove the offending memory, and switch back on again.

[The_Doctor]

I think I am working out this RAM stuff.

My motherboard needs DDR DIMM that is 266Mhz(PC2700) runs on 2.5 volts and is DDR SDRAM.

So the DDR DIMM is the type of interface.
the 266Mhz is the speed
the 2.5 volts is the power supply
the DDR SDRAM is the type of RAM.

Is this correct?

[fret]

I think I am working out this RAM stuff.

My motherboard needs DDR DIMM that is 266Mhz(PC2700) runs on 2.5 volts and is DDR SDRAM.

So the DDR DIMM is the type of interface.
the 266Mhz is the speed
the 2.5 volts is the power supply
the DDR SDRAM is the type of RAM.

Is this correct?

Not bad

The full name of the memory would be PC2700 266MHz DDR SDRAM DIMM

Working from the back end of that giant list of acronyms....

DIMM - is the type of interface - Dual In-Line Memory Module

SDRAM - is the type of memory - Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory (the synchronous bit refers to the module transporting date in both directions simultaneously)

DDR - is Double Data Rate - the memory can send twice as much data per clock cycle, resulting in lower possible cas latency timings (such as 2-2-2-1 etc)

266MHz - the internal speed of the memory, should be matched to the the same speed of, in the case od DDR - (motherboard FSB / 4) * 2 , if it was normal SDRAM and not DDR SDRAM the equation would be (motherboard FSB / 4), because the memry isnt operating at double data rate.

PC2700 - a unique referance to the speed of the module, for marketing purposes i presume - i have no idea what, if there is any, the logic is behind the PCxxxx numbering syste is.

Voltage is largely irrelivant to most users, unless you are going to be seriously overclocking systems.