4 DIMM Slots 3 modules

[ewarmour]

I have a Dell XPS with the ram set up as such:

PC2-4200 / 533 MHz

Dimm 1 512 MB
Dimm 3 empty
Dimm 2 512 MB
Dimm 4 empty

I bought another 1 gig module. Which slot should it go in and why?

Thanks for any help

 

[mechBgon]

Which slot should it go in and why?

None. You want matched pairs of modules. Return that puppy and get two matched 512's.

 

[ewarmour]

Cool. Thanks!

 

[Jiggz]

Or get another 1GB stick for a total of 3GB!. Or sell the old 2X512mb and stay with 2X1GB sticks

 

[Ionizer86]

Do the new intel chipsets definitively have to take matched pairs? What if you have two 512's in two slots on the same memory channel and the 1GB module on the other side?

On my NF2 Ultra 400 chipset (Athlon XP) I have two sticks of Crucial 256MB on one channel and a 512MB Kingston stick on the other channel. The system boots up in Dual Channel with no issue and i get my full 1GB worth of ram.

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: Ionizer86
Do the new intel chipsets definitively have to take matched pairs? What if you have two 512's in two slots on the same memory channel and the 1GB module on the other side?

On my NF2 Ultra 400 chipset (Athlon XP) I have two sticks of Crucial 256MB on one channel and a 512MB Kingston stick on the other channel. The system boots up in Dual Channel with no issue and i get my full 1GB worth of ram.

nForce2 is the flexible flyer. With its crossbar setup, it can do it. With Intel's approach, at best you would get a working system that's stuck in single-channel mode.

 

[techwanabe]

Originally posted by: mechBgon

Which slot should it go in and why?

None. You want matched pairs of modules. Return that puppy and get two matched 512's.

I just installed a 512 mb stick in two Dells at work. Both computers have 4 slots and 2 128 sticks in them for an original 256. I popped the 512 into one of the two free slots and it registered a total of 768 mb afterward.

IIRC, yes, you need paired sticks to run in dual channel mode, but that really only gives a significant speed boost if you run shared video memory. Otherwise the difference will probably be imperceptable. But I'm going from "memory" here, no pun intended.

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: techwanabe

Originally posted by: mechBgon

Which slot should it go in and why?

None. You want matched pairs of modules. Return that puppy and get two matched 512's.

I just installed a 512 mb stick in two Dells at work. Both computers have 4 slots and 2 128 sticks in them for an original 256. I popped the 512 into one of the two free slots and it registered a total of 768 mb afterward.

IIRC, yes, you need paired sticks to run in dual channel mode, but that really only gives a significant speed boost if you run shared video memory. Otherwise the difference will probably be imperceptable. But I'm going from "memory" here, no pun intended.

My tests with Intel P4 systems showed about a 15% increase in antivirus scanning speed with dual-channel. My way of thinking is, if you're going to bother owning a Pentium4, then don't hobble it (any further) by choking it down to a single-channel memory situation.