Adding Ram And Another Question

[Kringle]

I have a friend that I'm trying to help with her computer. She has an old pentium 3 with PC64 ram cards in it but want to add more ram. I have an old motherboard which has a pentium 2 with PC64 ram cards in it that I no longer use and thought I would add them to her board to give some more ram. Can I do this without rebooting or what do I have to do to accomplish this? Is it as easy as shutting down and then just add the extra ram cards or what?

Thanks,

Kringle

[camble]

You definately want to shut down, or risk giving yourself an electric shock and/or damaging the motherboard. As long as the memory is compatible and set properly you should be fine. Memory is detected and tested upon boot, if there are any problems, you'll find out then. Be careful not to damage the slots when you place the memory, or you could ruin the motherboard. Also, disconnect the power cord and ground yourself by touching the metal frame before touching the motherboard to avoid damage from static electricity.

Adding more memory should increase the speed of your machine, especially when switching between applications, since less disk swapping is necessary.

Edited July 5, 2005 by camble

[waldwolf]

Kringle - The earlier P2's and P3's (and their Celeron brothers) mostly used 66, 100 and 133MHz SDRAM's. While in most cases they can be mixed, it is best to use a higher rather than lower recommended speed. As your system appears older than your friends, it may not give her optimum performance.

Check your friends make/model here for specific replacement type recommended, then check against your P2 stick to see if its a compatable type/speed.

And as camble advises, unplug the tower from the mains and make sure you've "grounded" yourself, before handling the memory (a wrist ground-strap would be best).

good luck

[Kringle]

Thanks Camble and Waldwolf and I don't know what she has in hers or the manufacturer until I see it. My two sticks are PC-100 so I'll check it out and let you know the outcome. I don't remember the manufaturer of mine and it's all apart now. LOL

Thanks again,

Kringle

[h90]

no risk of electric shock at 5-12 volt, but if the pc is running it most probably make beep and than either it reboots or it never boots again!

If changing the Ram on a running computer I recommend you turn on a video camera and film it and share your experiences with us

You definately want to shut down, or risk giving yourself an electric shock and/or damaging the motherboard.  As long as the memory is compatible and set properly you should be fine.  Memory is detected and tested upon boot, if there are any problems, you'll find out then.  Be careful not to damage the slots when you place the memory, or you could ruin the motherboard.  Also, disconnect the power cord and ground yourself by touching the metal frame before touching the motherboard to avoid damage from static electricity.

Adding more memory should increase the speed of your machine, especially when switching between applications, since less disk swapping is necessary.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[Kringle]

By rebooting, I meant do I have to save all info and then reload it. I didn't mean I was going to try and put the buggers in with it running.

I was born in the day but it wasn't yesterday. Jeeez

Thanks for the tech help.

Kringle

[spacebass]

Check : www.crucial.com for lots of tips on memory.