256meg Memory : 8 chips or 16 chips ????

[Al Franz]

Just purchased 2 256meg sticks of memory on eBay and only 1 of them works in
my PC. Once piece has 16 chips (8 on each side), the other has only 8 chips
(8 on 1 side only). The one with 16 chips works on my PC. Does this make
sense or could the other piece be bad?

How does this relate to memory being 32x64, which is what my PC should
support. How do you get 32x64 when there are 16 or 8 chips ??? Confused!!

 

[steven67@]

Just purchased 2 256meg sticks of memory on eBay and only 1 of them works in
my PC. Once piece has 16 chips (8 on each side), the other has only 8 chips
(8 on 1 side only). The one with 16 chips works on my PC. Does this make
sense or could the other piece be bad?

How does this relate to memory being 32x64, which is what my PC should
support. How do you get 32x64 when there are 16 or 8 chips ??? Confused!!

..


32Mx64 indicates a 256MB, non-ECC module--32M x 64 bits is
2048Mbits(256MBytes). It's 32Mx64 regardless of the type of chips used on it.

Which PC do you have? Your system probably only supports chip densities up to
128Mbit. The 256MB module that works, was built with sixteen 128Mbit
chips--probably sixteen 16Mx8 chips. The module that doesn't work, was built
with eight 32Mx8(256Mbit) chips.

 

[spodosaurus]

Al Franz wrote:




.


32Mx64 indicates a 256MB, non-ECC module--32M x 64 bits is
2048Mbits(256MBytes). It's 32Mx64 regardless of the type of chips used on it.

Which PC do you have? Your system probably only supports chip densities up to
128Mbit. The 256MB module that works, was built with sixteen 128Mbit
chips--probably sixteen 16Mx8 chips. The module that doesn't work, was built
with eight 32Mx8(256Mbit) chips.

this is some interesting information, do you happen to have any web
references handy for this stuff that I could bookmark for future reference?

--

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donate. You are offered the chance to donate only if you match a person
on the recipient list. Visit www.marrow.org or call your local Red Cross
and ask about registering to be a bone marrow donor.

spam trap: replace shyah_right! with hotmail when replying

 

[larrymoencurly]

Just purchased 2 256meg sticks of memory on eBay and only 1 of them
works in my PC. Once piece has 16 chips (8 on each side), the
other has only 8 chips (8 on 1 side only). The one with 16 chips
works on my PC. Does this make sense or could the other piece be bad?

The 8-chip 256MB sticks use 32M x 8 chips, which have too many address
lines for some chipsets to handle, so only half their capacity is
recognized. 16-chip 256MB sticks are usually fine because they use
16M x 8 chips, but I once got one with 32M x 4 chips that gave the
same problem with all my older stuff, except with my Intel i810 mobo,
which also had problems with 8-chip sticks.

What kind of price did you get on eBay? 256MB PC133 is really cheap,
and I didn't pay anything for the last 4-5 because of rebates.

 

[Wolfi]

What kind of price did you get on eBay? 256MB PC133 is really cheap,
and I didn't pay anything for the last 4-5 because of rebates.

Where f.e.?
All rebate sales I saw recently, either didn't tell/show the Ras refresh
count at all, only were 8k types or the guys selling it, didn't have any
kind of clue, what they are actually selling (this unfortunately was the
vast majority).
They all only have thoss stupid ideas about it being some "low" or "high
density" marketing bullshit, but of course they can't explain, to which
manufacturer specs this should match. Ignorant Morons.

Wolfi

 

[larrymoencurly]

Where f.e.?
All rebate sales I saw recently, either didn't tell/show the Ras refresh
count at all, only were 8k types or the guys selling it, didn't have any
kind of clue, what they are actually selling (this unfortunately was the
vast majority).

www.salescircular.com lists local specials (but they forget Fry's a
lot), but I don't see anything special this week. My guess is that
the next big sales will be during the weekend before Veteran's Day and
Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. The "Hot Deals" forums at
www.fatwallet.com and www.anandtech.com are good for finding out about
sales (often a week ahead of time -- they link to OfficeMax's November
rebate deals), coupons, and specials.

They all only have thoss stupid ideas about it being some "low" or "high
density" marketing bullshit, but of course they can't explain, to which
manufacturer specs this should match. Ignorant Morons.

Even if they understood the information, they probably still couldn't
provide any specifics because most companies don't supply them. For
example, I wanted to know the differences in Kingston 256MB PC2100 CAS
2.5 modules, some labelled "Assembled in USA," which worked fine, and
others from China, which always failed MemTest86. They had nothing
but basic information at their website, and their "second level" tech
support couldn't tell me the differences.

 

[Wolfi]

www.salescircular.com lists local specials (but they forget Fry's a
lot), but I don't see anything special this week. My guess is that
the next big sales will be during the weekend before Veteran's Day and
Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. The "Hot Deals" forums at
www.fatwallet.com and www.anandtech.com are good for finding out about
sales (often a week ahead of time -- they link to OfficeMax's November
rebate deals), coupons, and specials.

Thanks for those links ;-)
I'll have to monitor them closely for the next time, not only for finding
RAM, but also for good deals for a WD HDD and Lite-On CD-RW/DVD drive.

Even if they understood the information, they probably still couldn't
provide any specifics because most companies don't supply them. For
example, I wanted to know the differences in Kingston 256MB PC2100 CAS
2.5 modules, some labelled "Assembled in USA," which worked fine, and
others from China, which always failed MemTest86. They had nothing
but basic information at their website, and their "second level" tech
support couldn't tell me the differences.

Even Crucial, being a Micron subsidiary, doesn't even mention the used row
number of their memory cell arrays.
But of course they have to boast about the not really relevant CL figures.

Wolfi