Ram Compatibility

alexander the great

I am upgrading some iMac 350s and I've got two 64 MB chips left over. I was wondering if they would work in an eMac or a flat panel iMac.



I know a good amount about computers, it's ridiculous that I can't figure out how RAM compatibility works, oh well, maybe I'll be able to read up on it in the future.



Also, if I'm adding 128 MB to an iMac 350 that has 64 MB right now, should I move the 64 MB chip or just add the 128 MB chip to the free spot?

ghost_user_name

It's not likely you can switch the RAM. The old gumdrop iMac uses PC100 RAM whereas both the eMac and the sunflower iMac use PC133 (PC2100 in some 2003 iMac models). The number in the names PC100 and PC133 indicate the bus speed of the system. Of these two types of chips, you can use RAM that's faster than your bus and it'll throttle down, but you can't use RAM that's slower than your bus. In other words, you can use PC133 in an old 100 MHz bus, but you can't use PC100 in a 133 MHz bus.



Hope this helps.

alexander the great

I'm also wondering if it makes a difference which slot I put the bigger 128 MB chip into in the iMac 350 MHz.

kingofsomewherehot

It deosn't matter what slot you put a chip in.

spart

Also keep in mind that some computers can only use a limited ammount of RAM per chip on a RAM stick. This probably isn't true in your situation, but it's good to keep in mind when messing around with RAM. If I put a newer, faster RAM chip in my old tray-loading iMac, it will only see half of the RAM as the chips are twice as dense as it can recognize/address.