I have a 500 Mhz Etower Is and a 433Mhz Powerspec 4720 and would like to substantially increase the memory. There are now Pc100 chips from Kingston available to to 512mg and I would like to add 2 to each system, is this possible? If not can a add 1 512mg and 1 128mg chip?

You will have to check what ammount of memory the motherboard supports. A lot of older boards cannot support huge ammounts of memory or single modules bigger than 256MB. What do you need the extra RAM for? Seems like a bit of a waste of money to me, a 256MB module would prolly be worth more than your entire system.

EH?!

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Who's the man with the master plan?

You have to be careful in what you buy. If your running windows 98 u can't use more than 512.

<b> Read you manuals !!!!!!! </b>

Many boards around that time has a limit of 512 or 768. Further each slot was limited to 256MB of dual sided (16 chip) sticks.

Are these both Slot 1 CPUs?

What are the motherboards? You can try Sisoft Sandra or aida32 (freeware versions and very nice).

Oh BTW, PC133 SDRam will work in those slots too.

The loving are the daring!<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by Flinx on 03/13/05 05:06 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

I know that my systems are old. I also know that I'm probably considered an obsolete user with obsolete equipment. However like the turtle, I am slow but normally finish what I start.
I'm retired and can't afford to buy new computers evertime I turn around. I'm trying to do a little tutoring on the side, and needed the additional memory for some of the lessons on photography and basic computer software and hardware. I do have a small network running Win95, Win98se, Win 2000, Win XPpro and am playing around with Linux. I'm pretty good at software, but not so hot on hardware. I don't understand clock speed, and all the technical stuff dealing with memory.
I could sure put these to good use if I could get the memory up to 640. The specs on both allow for a maximum of 512,, but that is not quite enough.
Thanks for your comments

Actually, ignore that last post of mine, I'd just come in from work an was tired, I read it wrong I thought you posted:

"I have a 500 Mhz Etower 433Mhz Powerspec" - or something like that!
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Who's the man with the master plan?

You dont have to drop a huge amount of money to build a decent system, Since your retired im guessing you dont play games? This system will rock your old system for around 600$

ASUS P4R800-VM 110$ Canadian
Pentium 4 2.4e 160$
Samsung infineon 2 X 512MB PC3200 Ram 150$ canadian
Budget case with PSU - 40$
CDRW -35$
80GB Hard Drive 90$ canadian

This is a decent machine for your needs and wont be outdated to the point you cant use it for 5+ years. You dont have to give heavy into hardware to know what your talking about. I would recommend sinking a couple extra hundred dollars into a new system as opposed to trying to upgrade your ancient machine, you need more help feel free to pm me.

First let me thank you for your reply, the Asus is a good system, and I know you are right, but I'm only getting $827 from ssn and paying $16000 a year in health insurance and can only survive because of my wifes ssn. It's really a no brainer for me (I don't have that much). All I'm trying to do is bring some income in to try and restore my self esteem which is pretty low right now. Excuse me if I sound like I'm feeling sorry for myself, It's just life, and I'm determined to find a way to overcome ( matter of fact I'm plumb mad at the beaurcracy of ssn) the current obstacles I'm encountering. Like the turtle, I'm slow but not a quitter. Once again my sincere thanks for your reply

You read it right. I can get the 512 chips for $75 a piece, I have the 128 chips, harddrives, network cards and monitors which are mainly hand me downs from friends who have purchased new ones. I've replace most of the compnents with what I have on hand and can get 2 systems for the price of 2 chips if I can figure out if they will work, which is what I'm hoping to do. FYI - In the past, I've wired the house for networking, and have my wife's sewing machine connected to the internet, so I'm aware of all you guy's advice and have taken it into perspective. Thanks anyway

I would be careful about the 512MB chips. I have a couple old Gateways here at the office - one's a 450Mhz P2 that can only use 128MB SDRAM (fortunately it has 3 sockets). The 400Mhz Celeron can use 256MB per SDRAM, but only has 2 sockets (and they were both bought at the same time).

Powerspec has a good website where you can find out the specs of your motherboard and what capacity RAM it can use I think it's www.powerspec.com. I don't know about the other one, but they may have a similarly useful site.

Anyways, making the assumption that the 512MB SDRAM works on the mobos, yes, a 512 and a 128 should play nice together.

Mike.

I finally found a manual for the supermicro 370swd motherboard using the intel celeron ppga processor and it defines the memory as 3.3v, 168pin, dimm sdram however the chip must be sdram because of the intel 810 chipset. Kingston has both a 512 and 256 chips with the same specs, so I think maybe I'll try the 512 chip. Thank you very much and if there any more thoughts please advise.

First of, let me thank you for your response, it's appreciated.
Secondly, I finally found a manual on the powerspec, it has a supermicro 370swd motherboard with an intel celeron ppga processor.
The specs according to supermicros manual and according to kingston are identical. Both are 3.3v, 168 pin pc100 sdram. I'll be running XpPro on it if if if??? If you have any more thoughts on the subject please advise.

I once put a 512MB module in an ABit BH6. It only showed 256MB.. Got very very hot and burned before I could replace it (had the 256MB when I came home). I think it overtaxed the "coil" which is slightly blackened.

Took 8MB of graphics memory with it and I can't use anything but 8bit graphics.

Don't suggest you try 512MB modules!!!

The loving are the daring!

You better make sure you can use a 512MB module. Because 512MB SDRAM modules are normally built using (32Mx8) chips, which is considered a high density chip for SDRAM.

Many older PC-100 motherboards do not support (32x8) configurations. This also includes 256MB modules built from (32x8)

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I have a bunch of older spare parts, mb's, cpu's, memory, etc.

PM me Floyd if you are interested. If it'll help ya, you can have it.

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Honestly I would recomend upgrading ur entire system, my 1.1Ghz Athlon T'bird is now worth about £10. It would cost u a tiny ammount to upgrade to such a system and it would really increase your performance.