RAM

What model computer do you have? It's real easy to look up online.



The brands that I use are Crucial, Kingston, G.Skill, and have used OCZ.



You want to have matched pairs. On 32 bit machines I use 2 x 2gig. A quick note. Some XP and Vista 32 fresh installations don't like to see 4 gig. Solution is to load the OS with 2 gig, do all the Windows updates, and then install the second stick.



On 64 bit machines....what can you afford?!? Skies the limit.

I recently upgraded the RAM for my Dell Dimension. Forget the model #. I do remember Dell being pretty specific about what kinds it will take.

I played it safe and got a Dell 2GB card from their site, upping my total to 3GB.

Although, if I start using any multi-band comps, things can get sketchy.

HP wants you to buy their branded ram too. It's not necessary. You do need to know what speed and timing is allowed. If you don't know there are utilities that will tell you such as SiSandra. Alternately, you could go to Crucial.com and use their utility and then once you have the speed go to Newegg and purchase what you need.

TheJackAttack wrote: On 64 bit machines....what can you afford?!? Skies the limit.

Actually, don't buy anything more than 16 exabytes :wink:

Apart from the logistics of having and keeping 16XB of RAM (I mean, the PSU alone would need to be overpowered) I can't imagine anyone ever being able to mix that many samples into the same song, even at 192KHz/32bit floating point.

That's why I winked.

1XB is probably going to be pretty tough, let alone sixteen of them.

My advice is to get two sticks of 2gig. While it will work with multiple brands we are shooting for the best stability. And as you said, RAM is cheap. This comes from everything working together. My preference in that list would be for one of the G.Skill sets.



You want 2 x 2GB.

I would say G.Skill, Cruicial, or Kingston.



My experiences...

My brain hurts trying to comprehend a single ExaByte. I mean i see the number on paper yeah, but to comprehend it, wow!



And always buy the same brand of memory for multiple sticks.

What is you computer age, model and/or service tag? Dell's original spec for many of its pc's was indeed 2 gig before DDR became so cheap. Usually if the BIOS are the latest version it will take three or four just fine. My Inspiron 9400 for instance is spec'd by Dell at 2 gig max. Whatever. It ate up 4 gigs like it was candy.



As to going from 1 gig to 2 gig, you will notice a performance jump for sure. Everything will be perkier. Like you just gave it one of those little purple pills and watched some guy throw a football through a tire swing.

I took a quick spin through your computer specs. I think because of that particular processor and the cost vs performance benefit I would stick to a 2 gig max.



I have no doubt it would take 4 gig provided you have the A04 bios (you ought to have it anyway. However, that processor is known to have some performance issues that would outweigh any added benefit to RAM past 2 gig.

Yes.



http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/driverslist.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&ServiceTag=3834X81&SystemID=DIM_PNT_P4_3100&os=WW1&osl=en&catid=&impid=

No. It just increases (usually) stability with the motherboard. You should not notice any changes. It is mostly a good maintenance issue. Dell is pretty good about having a self flashing utility. You don't need the old 3.5 floppy anymore. Sometimes when the models first came out the initial bios were not stable with all the in built switches etc and bios updates were required to rectify that.



Just download it, close all programs and execute the download.