Installing memory?

[Dillinger4]

Are there any precautions that i should take when installing more memory? The only think that i remember hearing is that an electric shock could fry the chip if one wasn't careful. Is there anything else that i should take into consideration when doing this?

[Gimlin]

Yah watch out for shock. Just touch your case before you handle it.

[Jethro]

Turn off the power

As Gimlin states, touch the case to discharge static electricity.


Ok technically

Ensure the new stick(s) are the same memory as the existing stick(s). If unsure rip a stick out and take it along with you when you buy the new one(s). Also take the motherboard specs with you, sometimes can be cheaper to completely replace existing sticks, with higher memory per stick configs.

As to inserting them, they only go in one way really, shoule have a small nick out of the top of the stick board to indicate correct way of doing this. Firmly seat them, and ensure the retaining tabs on the slot have enjoyed. Power up and away you go.

Psst...keep the lid off till you have powered up and ensured the new memory is recognised.... if haven't done this before, there is no change needed to BIOS....pretty much plug and play here.


Cheers.

[Dillinger4]

Sweet! thanks. I guess you really can't get an easier upgrade than that. I checked the spec for my comp and gateway says that i have three banks. Im running 64 megs of ram right now so ill have to see if one bank has the whole 64 or if it has two banks of 32's. Does the BIOS have a limiting factor in regards to the maximum amount of memory my machine can handle? It's not much(somewhere in the upper 300 range) but i said to one of my friends that i wanted to max out the memory and he replied that my BIOS probably would't allow it.

[Gimlin]

Well each slot can hold 512 ram (1g rarely get that ram) so thats a possiblity of 512 *3 which is 1536. So you could have any where from 1g to 3g of ram all depending on your mobo. Also since you comp is a gateway chances are you have 2 32 sticks instead on 1 64

[Jethro]

Hmmm...the BIOS thing. If your slots take 32mg, probably ok to can the stick and go 64 or 128, be careful of the type of stikc you can get, verify it'll work with your motherboard.

Yeap easy upgrade, BIOS decides it's there and windows kind of just uses it, without any of that new hardware carry on....