Help me with a RAM and video card question (1 Viewer)

[chris rick]

I have a Dell Dimension 8200 desktop computer with a 64 meg gforce card and 256 mb ram...I was looking at a 512 mb stick of ram (ddr) at sam's club yesterday for like 88 bucks and an awesome looking (newest model I think) 256 meg video card (gforce) with dvi out, etc. Would these work with my pc? Any other recomendations? Thanks!

 

[SethH]

Check if the video card is AGP or PCI. If it's PCI it will work with your computer for sure. If it's AGP, you'll need to check the specs on your computer. As for the RAM, what brand was it? Some "el cheapo" RAM is unstable and not worth buying. Also, you'll need to check out the speed of the RAM. RAM is usually labeled as PC2700 or PC3200 etc. You need to find out what speed RAM you need. I'm sure there's a software way to do it. If nothing else, go to support.dell.com and punch in your system number and you should be able to find out the speed of your RAM. Good brands to look for are Kingston, Corsair, and Mushkin. I would definitely upgrade your RAM if you're running XP as 256 is the minimum for XP.

 

[Tom Rags]

Be careful...Dell has proprietary RAM that is quite expensive. Your average run of the mill RAM may not work on your Dell (i.e., the stick you see at Sams). Double check before you buy and open!

 

[SethH]

Dell has proprietary RAM? That just doesn't seem right. I'm sure they don't have proprietary motherboards which they'd have to have to use proprietary RAM. Perhaps they use RDRAM which is quite expensive, but it is not proprietary.

 

[WayneO]

Not true. Also, sometimes the mobo's are proprietary, mostly with case fitament and power supplies, not memory though.