Memory ?

[whalebone]

Is it my memory ?.......probably .
A mate has asked me about upping the ram on an older pc and for the life of me I can't work out (remember) which will give him the better option, below is the screen capture from the "Crucial" scanner. FSB is 266. Running XP Home service pk 3
Thanks in advance.
Phil.

• Maximum Memory Capacity: 2048MB, 3072MB
• Currently Installed Memory: 1GB
• Available Memory Slots: 1
• Total Memory Slots: 3
• Dual Channel Support: No
• CPU Manufacturer: AuthenticAMD
• CPU Family: AMD Athlon(TM) XP2000+ Model 6, Stepping 2
• CPU Speed: 1678 MHz
• Customers should verify processors are C Revisions for 266MHz FSB. If processor is B Revision the FSB is only 200MHz.According to ASUS, the A7A266 motherboard will accept ECC but will not operate it in ECC mode.Memory configurations for Windows 95/98/ME with greater than 256MB, require adjusting the Vcache settings as outlined by Microsoft article Q108079.This motherboard has two 184-pin DIMM sockets which support up to 2GB of DDR SDRAM and three 168-pin DIMM sockets supporting up to 3GB of standard SDRAM.

[mixture]

1/ First rule of computing : The uneducated user will not be able to tell the difference between anything. Be that RAM chip speeds or RAM chip configurations. So might as well let cheapest price rule the roost.

2/ If you've got slower chips already in your computer, then the faster chips will run at the slower speed. Worth checking before you waste money on faster chips.

3/ Fewer chips is better than more unless your motherboard is capable of interleaving or other fancy stuff. So rather than, for example, 2x512MB, 1x1GB would be better.

[Saab Dastard]

That mobo allows the use of either the 2 x 184 pin sockets or the 3 x 168-pin sockets, but not both.

I know for a 100% certain fact that the DDR capacity of that mobo is NOT 2GB RAM! I have a PC with that very board, and it will not accept 2 x 1GB modules. If you hunt hard enough, you will find that admission by Asus on their website.

It "should" therefore take up to 1.5GB DDR (1024 + 512 184 pin modules) - I'm running it with a single 1GB module, and I tried it with 1.256, but I thought it was unstable.

I've not tried it with the SDRAM modules, as they are very much slower.

I've just bought a replacement mobo that I can utilise the AGP graphics from this PC and the Athlon 64X2 from another PC where I upgraded the CPU.

To be honest, the single core PC is now very slow, even with Win XP, and I want to move on to WIN 7.

Upgrading the RAM on that PC is throwing good money after bad, IMHO.

SD

[Booglebox]

Seconded. That is a hella old motherboard. My parents PC from 2002 has a newer motherboard than that. Your memory upgrade will cost £30-40 - better to pay another £50 and get yourself a second hand 2007-era PC with dual core and DDR2 RAM from eBay.

[whalebone]

Thanks folks, I had a hunch myself that there was a problem getting this to run at 2g and indeed there is a little evidence to that effect on the web. We all agree that he will be tipping his £'s down the drain and I will show him your comments to convince my mate that I was right all along.

Many thanks,
PA