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Interested Anyone |
| updated December 11, 2003 |
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When I bought the present computer about three years ago it came with 64 megabyte of system RAM. I was disappointed with the idea of a computer coming with the bare minimum of RAM. Yes it was just enough to start the operating system which at the time used about 63 megabytes of RAM to operate. However nothing else would work because there was only 1 megabyte of RAM left. I did not like the idea of paying $3600 for a computer that needed to be upgraded even before you started to use it. I called my favorite supplier and Cam came to my rescue with a 256 RAM chip which would boost system RAM to 320 megabytes of RAM. The cost back than was about four hundred dollars and that bought the computers price to $4,000 without any sales tax. There was no deal in what was to be a big sale cause it was at the end of the season and the next generation of computers were on their way. In the next three years I learned to love this laptop computer. I loved the portability that allowed me to bring my work to the customer. Or I could move from work to home and continue with a project or deadline. I added a wireless mouse, CD burner, and even an external monitor. There was a fast ethernet network card waiting for me to connect. It came with two USB version one port and two firewire. I added a pc SCSI card so that I could run an external scanner, hard drive and cd burner once used with an older computer. The monitor LCD took me some getting use too and many attempts to adjust the light and color of the LCD screen so that human tones looked good to me to pass as human. I would turn the computer on in the morning and turn it off the next early part of the morning. What I'm trying to say is that I loved this computer and if I could have I would have gone to bed with it too. Than that awful day came where the 256 RAM chip failed and I could not open any of the mega systems of software neatly positioned on the internal hard drive. Instead at start up a notice that I had never seen before on the screen announced that the systems operating system had detected a problem with memory and that I should contact a technical rep. After that the computer acted as if it had an on board virus. So I did what anyone would do ran anti virus to fix the problem, than I ran Nortons fix it all software and at the end of all that optimized the drive five times. One other thing I did was clean off about 2.5 gigs of information that had been there for about three years. I love those CD burners for just this kind of occasion. I called Cam and he had assured me that he would have a new RAM chip for me by Tuesday. I knew when I had bought the RAM that it was warranted for life. However in the last eight years of owning a computer I have never had faulty memory RAM. I did however just resent experience video RAM failure, but by pulling out the video card the computer once again recognized that there was the video card that came with the original system. I went from 32 megabytes down two only having two megabytes of video RAM. I tried everything short of throwing the computer out the window. My only saving grace of not throwing the computer out the window was in the basement there were no windows. I do thank that I still had another computer, however this one was about ten times slower but still I was able to access the internet at a painful 10 Mbps compared to my newer system which would access at 100 Mbps and the system of today can access at up to 1000 Mbps. What happened was there were early warning signs to tell me that a memory problem was occurring. My problem at the time was I did not know what to look for. I had noticed on some occasions that when I opened up a new window that it took a little longer to come in. Near the end of the chips life I noticed that only parts of the window was being redrawn but I still did not suspect RAM. I did however think that it might be a virus attack even with software working in the back ground which normally checked for things like that. RAM can stop working at anytime. On a single RAM chip there are many chips on one circuit board. The more memory the more chips mounted on one circuit board. It only takes one chip to fail and the circuit board is rendered useless. Heat does not normally effect them unless they have been melted. Static can be a factor but I see less technical people using a static wrist belt. If you hold them on the side rather than touch the actual chip with your fingers, you will be safe. Static can burn these chips out. The pins can easily be bent when they are put into the computers memory slot. You can do it yourself as long as you follow instructions an first line the circuit board with the memory slot before force is applied to snap them into place. Once the new RAM was secured in my computer it started up with no problems. I took it home and we made up. Everything works just as it had the day before the misunderstanding took place between man and machine. I learned about RAM and that it is better not to throw your computer out the window. it is good to know someone in technical just in case your computer does new wacky things.Thank you Cam for saving my butt and making Wednesday a better day. If you have any questions about either video or system RAM you can email Steven anytime at info@waymorewebs.com Just mention either Video or system RAM in the subject box. Happy Computin |
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