What RAM?

Z

zilch

Guest
I have a P3 866
128 MB RAM
Windows 98SE
And GeForce Ti4200 (soon)

Now I need more RAM, was going to get 256 MB but people have been saying to get 512, should I buy a 512 chip, or 2 * 256 chips, and scrap my current one, Someone told me more than 512 MB does nothing if you have Windows 98, you need 2000 or XP to have more, dont really want to scrap my current 128 chip of RAM.

What should I do, and wheres the cheapest place to buy RAM these days?, still crucial.com?

kthx
 
A

Alrindel

Guest
How many SDRAM slots does your motherboard have? (either 2 or 3 is usual).

If you have two, why not get a 512 and keep your 128? More memory is always better - personally, I have 3x256 in mine.
 
B

boni_ofdavoid

Guest
Yep, more memory the better. Though I doubt more than 512MB will help DAOC unless you are running other stuff at the same time.

More memory will help Win98, your friend is mistaken.

I would advise an upgrade to Win2k or XP though.
The only reason not to take XP is the standard of the video card drivers, and this is not an issue with GeForce cards.

Impossible to say where the best place to buy memory is as the prices change day by day. I got a really good deal last time I walked into my local Maplins, but for mail order I recommmend www.novatech.co.uk.
 
N

Nazgul

Guest
i think windows 98 does not support more than 512mb of ram i.e. more ram wont do anything
 
B

boni_ofdavoid

Guest
yeah, good point, another reason to go for win2k or XP.
 
Z

zilch

Guest
Dont have money for RAM, Win XP, Geforce, so I have to pick, I have a Dell 4200, no idea what motherboard but its about 2-3 years old, so im guessing only 2 slots.

But would 512 MR Ram be THAT much better than just 128 + 256?

Zilch
 
B

boni_ofdavoid

Guest
128MB alone is a bit low and your machine will be swapping to hard disk too much with just this. If you got just another 128, then 256MB in total would probably be enough to cure most of the memory bottlenecks. I dont think the transition from 256MB -> 512MB will gain you THAT much if you are only concerned about the performance of DAOC.
 
A

Alrindel

Guest
Originally posted by Nazgul
i think windows 98 does not support more than 512mb of ram i.e. more ram wont do anything
Click to expand...

Nope. Windows 9x (that is 95, 98, 98 Second Edition and Millenium) can address up to 2GB of physical RAM and another 2MB of virtual memory.

There is a known problem with having more than 512MB in these operating systems, though - a component called the "protected-mode cache driver" (vcache) sets its own size dynamically depending on how much RAM is present in the machine at boot, and if you have more than 800MB or so (system RAM + graphics card) it will make itself too big, and crash Windows. I had this problem with Windows 98SE, 768MB of RAM and a Geforce 3 graphics card with 128MB. All you have to do is set the vcache maximum size manually, and it works great.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q253912&gssnb=1
 
Z

zilch

Guest
Well 512 + 128 it is then, I guess i can pay for it

thx for your help all
 
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