Hi all
I bought a pc a while back and it was advertised as having 1gb of
pc3200 ram. However, upon inspection I realise it actually has 1gb of
pc2700. Do you think it's worth complaining about? Will there be a
noticeable difference in speed?
thanks for your help
Richard
How much does the seller know about computers ?
Was the mistake in the RAM, a deliberate attempt to defraud ?
If so, take it back and get the correct RAM. If the seller has
half a clue, their RAM will be serialized (have a sticker with
the company name on it, or some other identifying mark). A
seller may refuse to help, if you have removed any stickers
that say "do not remove". A good company has methods of tracking
inventory, so they can prove or disprove the product is as
was provided to you.
The next question would be, does the memory pass a test with
memtest86+ ? And if you run Prime95 or Orthos, is the computer
error free for at least four hours ? If the answer to either question
is no, then you have nothing to lose by returning the machine
for maintenance. (I.e. If the computer is not working well,
you should have taken it back by now anyway. I recommend testing
any computer, no matter who built it. Take it back if it doesn't
pass the tests, without errors.)
I bought a computer once as a gift, and the seller's tech support
was not very good. They seemed to have a supply of bad memory,
and a couple trips back to the shop did not result in an
error free computer. Since the gift was for Christmas, and
only days remained to meet the deadline, I ended up buying more
memory from another shop.
So, if the current memory works, and the seller appears to be
incompetent, then I would not take it back if the computer was
working well. If they appear to know their stuff, then the
machine should work just as well, once the right memory is
installed.
If you want to know whether this is making a difference or not,
tell us:
1) Processor type - Like Pentium 4 2.53GHz FSB533 512KB L2 cache.
2) Motherboard type - Asus P4B533 or something similar.
3) How many RAM sticks ?
What is written on the sticker for the RAM ? Does it actually
say PC2700 on it ?
The DIMM has a small chip on it, called the SPD. The SPD contains
a record of the timing information for the chip. You can get
a program
http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php and execute cpuz.exe .
Now click the "SPD" tab in the window. The timings for the memory
are listed there. If you need to copy and paste the info, you can
also go to the "About" tab, and click "Register Dump". That will
store a whole bunch of info, in a text file for you. Open the
resulting text file with a text editor, and you can copy any
necessary info.
The memory on my computer reads:
DIMM #2
General
Memory type DDR
Manufacturer (ID) Micron Technology (2CFFFFFFFFFFFFFF)
Size 512 MBytes
Max bandwidth PC3200 (200 MHz)
....
Timings table
Frequency (MHz) 200
CAS# 2.0
RAS# to CAS# delay 2
RAS# Precharge 2
TRAS 8
To convert the 200 number, multiply by 2 for DDR (double data rate),
then multiply by 8 (bytes transferred per bus cycle). The result
in this case is 3200MB/sec transfer rate. If your RAM only has an
entry for PC2700, the frequency listed would be 166MHz. The contents
of the SPD, should bear some relationship to the capabilities of
the RAM, but there are exceptions. For example, enthusiast (overclocker)
memory won't have a match between the sticker on the DIMM and the
contents of the SPD. But for commodity RAM like you've been given,
there should be better odds of the SPD matching the sticker. Using
CPUZ and the register dump, just gives an opportunity to cross
check the sticker, against the SPD chips contents.
The timings table can have multiple entries, and the fastest entry
would be considered the rating for the RAM. With enthusiast RAM,
they usually store a slower number in the SPD, in order to guarantee
that the motherboard can start properly the first time. With enthusiast
RAM, the user is responsible for setting up the frequency and the timing
numbers. But with commodity RAM, the BIOS is supposed to read the
timing table, and get the necessary parameters from there. That is
what "By SPD" or "Auto" does in the BIOS.
Paul
