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03/11/2006 12:18:14 AM · #1 |
Does anyone know if combining different memory chips would slow down your PC? I've got a P4 1.7ghz pc with 1.5 gigs of memory. I added the 1 gig just last week and seems like it slowed down a tad. Or maybe it's just me expecting a quick jump in speed processing. Anyway, maybe it's just time to reformat the damn hard drive. I just bought a 200 gig drive which I'll be installing in a few minutes so any help regarding the memory would be great ;)
Rikki |
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03/11/2006 12:30:01 AM · #2 |
It's possible that the extra memory addressesing is a little much for the board and CPU. An upgrade of those components wouldn't hurt.
I've heard very good things about the AMD Opterons.
If you're not ready to upgrade, though, a format/reinstall of the OS would definitely speed things up a little. |
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03/11/2006 12:33:50 AM · #3 |
| thanks jon! maybe i should just rid of the extra 512 megs and just settle for the gig huh? |
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03/11/2006 12:37:09 AM · #4 |
I'd keep the 1.5, personally, unless you can get your money out of it or use it elsewhere. Might help if you ever have a lot of images open in PS or something like that.
Although I guess it's kind of up to you, if you don't plan to upgrade the board/CPU for a while then maybe the light-load responsiveness is more important than the heavy-load performance for now... |
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03/11/2006 12:42:23 AM · #5 |
| Rikki, who's the geek now? |
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03/11/2006 12:50:38 AM · #6 |
I don't know from personal experience but I've heard that you always want the biggest chip in the first slot.
Maybe if you swap them it might work better. |
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03/11/2006 01:20:07 AM · #7 |
Did you match the bus speed? i.e. PC 3200 vs. PC 2700 and whatnot. If you didn't the system performance will suffer.
Good luck with the 200 gig drive. I just spent a week trying to get XP installed on it and realize the full capacity. I finally gave up and put the OS on an older 40 gig drive i had and put the 200 in as the d: drive. Just as well, I suppose. But frustrating nonetheless! |
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03/11/2006 01:27:12 AM · #8 |
well... i swapped it and it seems faster. i will most likely just make the 200 gig drive a slave drive. thanks all ;)
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03/11/2006 02:06:47 AM · #9 |
Also, if you mis-match memory (different speeds) it can have an affect. As well as brand.
Try removing the 512mb chip and seeing if the machien is faster with the just the one gig, and vice-versa.
- Saj
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03/11/2006 02:25:18 AM · #10 |
you can download this free utility CPU-ID to check if your new memory is the same speed as your system. Go to "memory" and where it says "frequency," multiply that number by 8, and where it says "type," if it says DDR then multiply the previous number by 2. Then go to "SPD" and look at the "max bandwidth" value of each memory module, it should be the same or higher than the number you got before. Do this for every slot. Or you can post the values/screenshots here...
Message edited by author 2006-03-11 02:33:50. |
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03/11/2006 06:17:29 AM · #11 |
With DDR RAM, the speed of all RAM will be the speed of the slowest memory. ( a chain is as strong as its weakest link ).
I.E. if you have 2 sticks of PC3200 and you add another stick of PC2100, even your faster RAM will run at PC2100 speed. |
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03/11/2006 10:00:14 AM · #12 |
The Porsche 914 comes to mind here... It's a Porsche alright but with a volkswagen engine. You've increased the gas tank but running the same engine... architecture of the 1.7G and will become the bottle neck with this much RAM. It won't hurt but won't run a whole lot better.
2.5G RAM don't buy you much "speed increase" on 1.7Ghz processor, (you won't notice it a whole lot, if any).
What the others have said... Mix and Match memory is a bad thing, as you will run at the Speed and clock settings of the Slowest stick.
DDR RAM (dual channel) only works in like pairs . 1 1Gig DDR 3200 will run in Single Channel Mode whereas 2 512G (Like sticks) will (if your motherboard supports) run Dual Channel Mode taking advantage of what DDR is all about.
Different Manufactors produce different results when paired with others as well. Value RAM is ah Value RAM and your results will vary.
I got a little wordy from this point forward so I will do a Tut on how to tune up an XP machine ... Stay tuned...
It would be interesting to see why the guy below had so much trouble getting XP on a 200G drive though...
Message edited by author 2006-03-11 10:01:25.
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03/11/2006 10:16:32 AM · #13 |
Originally posted by awpollard:
It would be interesting to see why the guy below had so much trouble getting XP on a 200G drive though... |
Because pre-SP1, XP only supported drives up to 137(ish?)Gb. If you only have an original XP install disk your only options are to (a) partition it, install on the lower chunk and sort out the rest after applying the service packs, or (b) mess about creating a slipstreamed XP install disk.
If you really want to start down that road, somewhere like this would probably be a good place to start. |
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03/11/2006 11:05:45 AM · #14 |
Another issue with the large hard drive could be the motherboard BIOS not being new enough to support disks of that size. The major brand hard drive manufacturers make software utilities that allow older hardware/Windows versions to see and use larger disks.
I am using an old Compaq Deskpro Pentium 2 400MHz as my home file server. I loaded it with all my large, old ram chips, run Windows 2000 Server on the 3.2GB hard drive that was in it, and bought a 120GB drive for the files. The computer wouldn't even recognize the drive, but the utility software that came with it allowed both the motherboard and Windows to see and address the full capacity and I've had no problems with it.
Message edited by author 2006-03-11 11:05:59.
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03/11/2006 11:21:34 AM · #15 |
Yeah, I flashed my BIOS with the latest version of firmware and couldn't get around the XP 137GB limit without buying PartitionMagic. I'm too cheap for that therefore the 40GB drive solution.
It's just as well, I prefer to have all files in one place for easy backup instead of spread out all over Bill's Creation in My Documents, Program Files and more (my wife is the biggest offender :-).
Even now, my largest recognized capacity as a slave drive is 186GB. It seems like I could make greater use of the drive, but haven't found out how in online forums (for free) or using Windows utilities.
If anyone has solved this, I'd be interested to know how... |
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