h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I often get upset at my computer. It is so slow, it takes ages to even start up. Then try to run more than one application at a time - often it seems that my computer has a hard time running ONE application at a time. So the answer is: I need more RAM.

Now I am worried that if I go and buy any piece of RAM, it will not fit into my system. What do I need to know about my computer to avoid unpleasant surprises?

My computer works with, what is the word, SD-RAM. It has a Pentium 2 with 233 MHz. It currently only has 32 MB RAM. On Windows 98, how much RAM can a system deal with?

So many questions... But please don't tell me that the best way to improve my computer's performance is to buy a new one...

Y.

its more a question how much ram will your computer motherboard accept.

Ok, how do I check that?

did you get a handbook with the computer?
I increased my computer from 128mb to 374mb. Crashes less often now.

No such luck there. Handbooks must not have been invented yet when I bought the PC. Neither was customer service... The shop I bought it in never bothered to help when at first I could not even go online with my machine... Only after a friend of mine de- and re-installed Windows did that finally become possible. So I am not going to those guys to ask them, hey, back in '97 you sold me a computer, give me the facts about that...

Anyway, no handbook. Sorry. What else?

Y.

You can get books from the library about computers. They will show you what ram looks like and where to find it. if you are lucky you will have a spare slot for some more memory. It must be the same kind of memory as you already have. You may be able to increase by 32mb to 64mb. But this all depends on the computer you have. There are plenty of people on h2g2 who know far more than me about computers, hopefully one of them can offer some advice.

Best place to go is crucial.com - on the front page you'll find a drop down menu that will help you fing your exact model pc and not only the correct type of RAM for it, but also the maximum amount of RAM it'll take

I seem to get to the bottom of this...

You see, the crucial misconception underlying your assumptions is that a computer is necessarily a system. That may be so in most cases. My computer, however, is first and foremost, a mess. I think those so-called people who sold it were really happy to find an innocent and believing customer like me who would buy their crap. That is not to say that may computer is bad, per se. But I have the impression that it has not so much been designed, but rather assembled.

But to the question at hand.

Crucial.com asks me what kind of computer I have. Their choices are PC100, PC133, PC2100 and higher numbers after that. Well, how am I to know that? All the numbers I ever come across concerning my computer are 2 (as in Pentium 2), 233 (as in 233 MHz for the CPU, I guess) and that is about it.

As to the manufacturers... Imagine me being not-so-clever about computers. Manufacturers of WHAT, I wonder? The mainboard? What IS a mainboard, anyway? Is there any chance that the so-called people who assembled my PC called it something else? And anyway...

It might be best if I just hand the computer to some PC doctor and tell them how much I am prepared to pay and let them do the thinking. But then again, my experience has made me rather paranoid there.

Anyone of you wanna come to Berlin, Germany, and fix my computer? At least I can make sure that there is enough beer for you guys and gals.

Y.

Ok. I've just been to the crucial.com website. Right in front of me is a dropdown menu which says 'Top manufacturers'. I click on that, select Compaq, and hit 'Go'. Now I've got a dropdown menu which says 'Select Your Compaq Product Line'. I choose Presario and hit 'Go'. Finally I get a dropdown menu which says 'Select Your Compaq Model'. I choose 5304 and hit 'Go'.

That all gets me to a page which is full of information about the memory for my PC, including this information:

System Info:

* Maximum memory: 384MB
* Standard memory: 32MB removable
* Slots: 3 (3 banks of 1)
* Explanation of memory terms

If for whatever reason you aren't able to use those menus because you don't know the make and model of your PC, I'd suggest that you take the case off your box, pull out the RAM, walk it to your local PC supplies shop and tell them that you want more of this. I think you said you had 32Mb? Even if you've only got one slot on your motherboard, you should be able to at least quadruple your current RAM by getting a single stick of 128Mb RAM of the same type as what you have now. Judging by the prices at crucial, you shouldn't have to pay more than around $40 US or your currency's equivalent.

My PC came with 64Mb, and I plan to triple it by getting two more sticks of the same.

Or you could just get a new PC

Hey, thanks for bearing with me... I do appreciate it, though I may not have sounded like it.
I looked at Start>Settings>System>System, and there it said "Computer: GenuineIntel." Would that be the manufacturer?

How can I find out the "maximum capacity" my computer (or whatever component thereof) can handle?

Y.

Whoaaa... We are getting there. I think.

So I installed that system analyzer offered on crucial.com. Of course that little program was unable to identify the system, but hey. It could at least give me a "main circuit board" id. (Would that, by any chance, be the motherboard?) I apparently have a "Board: Gigabyte Technology Co. Ltd. i440LX-W977" Ha!

Now, of course crucial does not list any such item.

I got carried away and googled "i440LX-W977," and on Gigabyte's homepage I was assured that my system will make it through the year 2000 alright. Go me! But... what I am really getting excited about is that on that webpage, they list several system names that have some "i440LX-W977" in them. The fun is that some of those system names also appear on crucial dot com. Does that maen what I think it maens? Can I assume that I have a GA686LX4, since that thing has a i440LX-W977?

Let me quote a line from Kraftwerk here... "It's more fun to compute!"

Y.

Somewhere on that crucial page about the GA686LX4 it says under "specs" that the "maximum density" is 64MB. Does that mean I can not go over that in terms of RAM? (Put different, all I can do is buy 64MB and kick out the original 32MB?)

Y.

It probably means that you can only have up to 64MB in a single stick.

A computer that age I'd expect the memory to be very expensive for piddling little amounts. Doubt it has standard SDRAM or anything.

O, my computer sucks, but not that bad... It does operate on SDRAM. If it chooses to operate at all, that is.

So what is that "stick" you mentioned? Anyway, I am told that there are three slots, only one of which is filled with a RAM thing (stick? chip? something...)

Y.

ok, i havnt bother reading the backlog, but this is what the ram slots look like http://support.eastaging.com/computer_building/motherboard.asp just read what it says, this should be what your computers motherboard looks like.


but i would definitly suggest getting a better computer. but two other things you could do to make it better without buying a new computer, is get a better mother board or get a better video card, the second would be more advisable as well as getting more ram

I updated the RAM on my machine to 5hundred and something, which made some* difference, but th enew graphics/video card; with 128 MB RAM onboard, did wonders for the speed and performance of the machine; and removed a lot of the random crashing events but the video/graphics card was £180 as its a newish machine it was (I determined) worth spending that on it might not be the case for an old machine

One possible snag with upgrading the graphics card on an oldish PC is that it's not so easy nowadays finding a decent graphics card for a PCI slot and older computers haven't always got an AGP slot (if you're wondering what I'm talking about... open your computer, you should see a row of white slots, some of which might have cards plugged into them... have a look to see if at the end of this row of slots there is a shorter, brown coloured slot (that's an AGP slot - if it's there) - if not your restricted to buying a PCI graphics card.

Do you want to hear something really funny... My graphics card has 8(!)MB. But, believe it or not, that never caused any trouble. I don't have software that requires much there. (My games are limited to minesweeper and such.)

Well, but I guess more RAM would be helpful anyway. As it is now, I can always go and make coffee once I tried to open a word document. By the time coffee is ready, the computer is done opening the doc... Ok, now I am exaggerating, but you may catch my drift.

Oh, and a new computer is totally out of the question. That would mean no money to pay the rent until Christmas, and I am afraid my landlord would not have that.

Y.

A stick is what fills one slot. So you might be limited to 64x3

Thought they'd be less suspiciously cheap than this:

http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=20085

More RAM should certainly help with that, : Though my lodger uses the computer for gaming I don't, but still find that the graphics card, and its bonkers RAM, just generally helps speed things up; i think that before, the graphics card would have been 'borrowing' use of RAM from the main RAM on teh motherboard, thus slowing things down somewhat I'm no puter person though