Geezues!

landbeforetimelover · **on:** May 18, 2008, 04:38:18 AM

I went into bestbuy, just looking around and I found this cool looking monitor/laptop stand. It was $35. I continued to walk around the store when I decided to upgrade one of the computers in my office with another gig of ram. I went and I picked out the ram I wanted and asked how much it was. $32! I looked at the monitor stand in my hands and just laughed. Ram is even cheaper than a cheap-o bent piece of plastic that wasn't too attractive anyway. I left the store with the ram, laughing all the way to the car. Lesson learned: There is no excuse if your computer isn't maxed out with ram (unless you don't know how to install it yourself and you don't want to pay someone to do it). I mean, the only excuse I can come up with is if your board would max out at 8gb and you have a 32 bit OS, then I can see not buying 8gb of ram (because xp and vista 32 don't recognize more than 3.5-3.8gb of ram). I'm going to go max out the computer in my room that's acting as a master today as a matter of fact. Screw this. 4gb of ram for the thing will only be $94.

: Ram just gets cheaper every time you turn around.

Kor · **Reply #1 on:** May 18, 2008, 06:11:22 AM

Yes, I find it surprising how cheap modern ram can be at times.

kjeldo · **Reply #2 on:** May 18, 2008, 09:08:51 AM

that is the power of the dollar,

Petrie. · **Reply #3 on:** May 18, 2008, 02:57:27 PM

The avg. consumer doesn't need 8gb of ram.

They're the ones buying the $400 Dell systems with celeron processors too.

landbeforetimelover · **Reply #4 on:** May 18, 2008, 03:13:53 PM

If you want to run vista right, you're gonna need a heck of a lot more power than a $400 computer can provide.

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action9000 · **Reply #5 on:** May 18, 2008, 08:31:29 PM

Quote

The avg. consumer doesn't need 8gb of ram.

I'd be amazed if anyone else on this forum needs more than 4GB of RAM. It's really a niche market, as Petrie pointed out.

You are so right though, LBTlover; RAM is getting amazingly cheap! Good thing too, because so many newer applications (Vista included) like eating upwards of 1GB+ each...combine that with a bit of cache and preloading and you're filling 3/4GB of RAM pretty fast anymore.

I am liking my 8GB, I won't deny it

: ...but again, the vast majority will never benefit from 8GB. I'd recommend 4GB to anyone (since it's so cheap) but more than that.....unless they're power users to the extreme, it's not necessary.

landbeforetimelover · **Reply #6 on:** May 18, 2008, 11:54:28 PM

You do have to remember though that you've got limited slots for ram. If you buy 4gb now, you'll probably want 8gb in a year or so. You'll have to throw out your perfectly good working ram to put the 8gb in, spending a lot more than if you had just gotten 8gb in the first place. Technology moves too fast not to have the best.

action9000 · **Reply #7 on:** May 20, 2008, 02:44:48 PM

Most desktop motherboards currently only support 8GB of RAM. By the time 8GB of RAM will be useful to the average consumer, motherboards will support up to 16GB / 32GB + of RAM and computers will be so much more powerful that chances are, an upgrade to a new computer would be worthwhile anyway.

You do have a point though: 8GB of RAM is less than $250 these days. It's nuts!

landbeforetimelover · **Reply #8 on:** May 20, 2008, 03:13:10 PM

Unless you spend $1,500 for a computer retail, it's not gonna have a MB that can accept more than 4gb of ram. If you go and look at HP.com, they sell computers for $600 with a gig of ram and a maximum memory expansion of 2gb.

NeptuneNavigator2001 · **Reply #9 on:** May 21, 2008, 01:56:38 AM

Bleh... Computers... Industry, moving too fast! *head explodes*

Seriously, though. Poor sap that I am, I can't buy enough stuff at once to build a "good" computer... I screwed up when I bought that dual-core CPU, though; that motherboard I bought only supports a single core, and TigerDirect doesn't have any more Socket 939 single core CPUs left! Boy, I'm screwed... (Time to win the lottery...)

landbeforetimelover · **Reply #10 on:** May 21, 2008, 02:07:54 AM

Wow. A motherboard that can only accept a single core processor? I didn't know they still sold those. When did you get it?

NeptuneNavigator2001 · **Reply #11 on:** May 21, 2008, 03:50:00 AM

*choke* A couple YEARS ago. That's how bad off I am! Yeah, it's that bad for me! And, if I was to get a REAL job, DSHS would probably want compensation, because I'd be making "too much income," and so, they would take it out of my check, for months and months...

...I have no life, and I have very little of a future... So, I'll exist, as one of the pawns in this demonic Chess set... I'll play the poor man's game... Since, ya know, only richies can afford that stuff... Sorry. I'm kinda in a bad mood about it all... Please understand...

Clawandfang · **Reply #12 on:** May 21, 2008, 12:52:18 PM

I can live with being a pawn if the game makes sense.

As has been mentioned before, mostly the amount of RAM you have seems to be dictated not by how much you can lay your hands on but how much you can fit onto your board.

action9000 · **Reply #13 on:** May 21, 2008, 05:40:48 PM

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Unless you spend $1,500 for a computer retail, it's not gonna have a MB that can accept more than 4gb of ram.

Seriously? Wow, that sucks. :blink:

landbeforetimelover · **Reply #14 on:** May 21, 2008, 05:41:04 PM

That's why it's great to have 4 slots for ram. If ya only got 2 slots for ram and your board can handle 8gb, you're gonna be spending a crapload on one chip. Forget to wear your wrist grounding strip and that one chip is done for.

action9000 · **Reply #15 on:** May 21, 2008, 05:44:04 PM

Do some boards only have two slots for RAM? I've never actually seen that. Mine have always had 4 and most of the higher-end boards, server boards and Mac pro boards have 8 (and support for up to 16/32 GB of RAM).

landbeforetimelover · **Reply #16 on:** May 21, 2008, 05:46:58 PM

I bought a computer not too long ago for $700. It had a 2.6ghz processor and a gig of ram which was expandable to 2gb. It only had 2 slots for ram.

EDIT: oh yeah. And I'm not an idiot for buying it. The computer has a dual core processor that's 64 bit.

NeptuneNavigator2001 · **Reply #17 on:** May 21, 2008, 07:08:13 PM

...Yeah, most of my computer equipment only has two slots available for RAM... I might have a board laying around that would have room for more, but, like that would even do me any good... Like say, two slots for SDRAM, and, four for, uh, whatever that other RAM type was that's obsolete now... You know, the chips that you used to have to SWING into the slot...

I also have like, three or four empty cases. Nothing in them. Just sitting there... And, they serve no use to me... No purpose.

Kor · **Reply #18 on:** May 21, 2008, 09:23:13 PM

Ram may be cheap now, but not everyone needs huge amounts of ram.

action9000 · **Reply #19 on:** May 22, 2008, 05:13:34 AM

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You know, the chips that you used to have to SWING into the slot...

Ahh, yes.

EDO RAM. My old 486 used that stuff.

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