Your daily dose of practical, easy to follow tech tips!
Question from Eric: My computer’s manual says the motherboard supports DDR3 RAM at speeds up to 1333Mhz.
I want to replace the old RAM sticks with new ones to max it out but right now the slowest DDR3 RAM sticks I can find locally are rated at 1600Mhz.
I don’t want to order online if I can possibly avoid it but I don’t want to damage my computer either.
Can my computer use the faster RAM or would it cause problems?
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
Question from Anthony J.: Rick, I have a custom built PC with an ASUS motherboard that supports DDR3-1333MHZ RAM. It’s about 5 or 6 years old as best I can recall.
I want to upgrade the memory from 4GB to 8GB, but the only RAM sticks I could find locally are DDR3-1600MHZ. Will they work with my motherboard without damaging anything?
Rick‘s answer: [Read more…]
Question from Mandy F.: I have a HP desktop computer that only came with 2 gigs of RAM.
I read that adding more will make my computer run better so I took the cover off and noticed that it had 2 empty RAM slots with 2 more already filled.
Best Buy had 4GB RAM chips on sale so I bought 2 of them and put them in. But the computer still only shows that it has 2GB of RAM instead of 10GB. What could be wrong? Thanks.
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
DDR3 memory has been the standard for years, but that will soon change. Our friends over at Crucial Technology have just announced that they’ll begin selling DDR4 RAM some time before the end of December 2013.
DDR4 promises to be a major upgrade over DDR3. The new memory standard doubles the speed of its predecessor while also doubling the maximum storage capacity per module from 8GB to 16GB. And just as important, the new DDR4 RAM will operate on a meager 1.2 volts of electricity which means it should run cooler and save energy. [Read more…]
Question from Renita: Rick, I have a Dell Inspiron 620 desktop computer with 4GB of RAM in it. It’s running Windows 7.
A friend told me that I should upgrade the memory to the maximum that it’ll hold because it’ll speed up my computer. I actually have two questions:
1 – Is he right?
2 – If he is, how much memory will this computer hold? [Read more…]