Laptop RAM question

[TampaSupremo]

My father has a Toshiba laptop running Windows Vista. It was extremely slow so I checked his system and found he was only running 512MB of RAM. I went out with him and bought 1GB and installed it this afternoon. It's running faster and more smoothly now. When I was installing the 1 gig I realized the laptop has two expansion slots. I know this may seem like a dumb question, but are there any reason that I should not install the old 512MB? I guess I'm asking because I never see computers advertised with 1.5GB of memory and I wanted to make sure I wouldn't screw something up (although I'm guessing it's OK).

Thanks all,

TampaSupremo

 

[Nicklor]

what is the speed/flavor of the 1.0GHz memory stick ... ? You can use both the sticks, but if the one is slower then the other, I believe both chips will run slower together.

 

[TampaSupremo]

Both are PC2-4200 SODIMM. the 512MB is Samsung and I think the 1GB is Ultra or something like that.

TampaSupremo

 

[Strayvector]

Installing the 512 will help, but better to downgrade Vista back to XP or buy another Gig...Vista is an extreme memory hog and really needs at least 2Gigs to run smoothly. You can also speed it up by shutting off the bells and whistles.

 

[Marcos]

Some RAM runs better in matched pairs but unmatched pairs won't do anything bad. I am no computer genius but have read that a few times. Good luck!

 

[SyrLinus]

Tampa, you may also want to consider that sometimes running different manufacturers of RAM can cause sporatic issues (e.g., page faults, BSODs, etc.) so it may not be a good idea to mix and match the two together (BBW).

 

[grateful1]

Keep it simple....get another matching GIG.

 

[BlindedByScience]

Some PC's / laptops require "dual channel" memory configurations, which means two identical sticks. If you don't install identical sticks, the motherboard will still boot and run, but it will run in "single channel" mode and memory access is far slower. You can check the recommended configurations for your particular laptop by referring to the owner's manual. If you can't find it, it's most likely available on line.

I have many PC's hit my bench where the owner says "...it blue screens / locks up / crashes all the time. I don't get it.....". What I find more often than not is that the installed memory has errors in it that is causing the data corruption. It's lots more common than you think. The answer is to test every new memory installation. I use Memtest86+. Memtest86+ runs from a bootable floppy so the OS doesn't come into play with the test environment. Best of all.....it's free for non-commercial use. Download it here. No PC leaves my bench unless it passes a 24 hour run of Memtest86+ with zero errors. Only right answer.

Good Luck - B.B.S.

 

[Mizicke5273]

Throw the other 512 chip in, it wont screw anything up. The more RAM the better.

Also mixing and matching brands wont hurt anything either.

 

[TampaSupremo]

Thanks for all the responses, folks. I spoke to my dad and he's happy the way it's running now so He'll keep the 512MB as a backup and I'll buy him a matching 1GB for his birthday to really get it running well.

TampaSupremo