Upgrade Laptop RAM

[tom66]

I'm thinking of upgrading my laptop's RAM from it's current 512 MiB to 1 GiB or even 1.5-2 GiB (according to Crucial, my chipset can take up to 2 GiB; and I've got a 32 bit processor so definitely not more than 3.2 GiB), as the required memory, 200-pin SODIMM DDR2 memory from Crucial is very cheap per megabyte. However, I have a few questions:


Will I see a significant speed boost? I have an Intel Pentium M 1.79 gHz, and I have reserved 968 MiB approximately for my swap, which rarely goes above 500 MiB.
Will it void my warranty? I have a Dell Inspiron 1300. It breaks so often I need a warranty.
Is it worth it for the speed boost?


Thanks,
Tom

[scragar]

You have said your swap is in use, so adding more ram will definatly have an effect since swap is so much slower than ram.

I wouldn't, if it can be helped, try to replace the ram youself, laptops tend to be very squashed together inside, and if you don't know what you are doing you can make it very hard to get the case back together.

If it's worth it or not, is up to you, you can expect that hard drive usage will fall, processes will respond quicker, and, if you upgrade to more than 1GB, you will find that the cache will really help when opening another program, but you should note that these effects will all be dependant on a lot of things, such as hard drive speed, how often you switch programs, what exactly is getting put in swap when it is in use etc.

[LookTJ]

I'm thinking of upgrading my laptop's RAM from it's current 512 MiB to 1 GiB or even 1.5-2 GiB (according to Crucial, my chipset can take up to 2 GiB; and I've got a 32 bit processor so definitely not more than 3.2 GiB), as the required memory, 200-pin SODIMM DDR2 memory from Crucial is very cheap per megabyte. However, I have a few questions:


Will I see a significant speed boost? I have an Intel Pentium M 1.79 gHz, and I have reserved 968 MiB approximately for my swap, which rarely goes above 500 MiB.
Will it void my warranty? I have a Dell Inspiron 1300. It breaks so often I need a warranty.
Is it worth it for the speed boost?


Thanks,
Tom


A decent speed if you buy a 1GB stick, so that you use one of the 256MB stick making up 1.25GB.
If you buy from Crucial and told Dell you bought RAM from Crucial, yes. But if you buy from Dell, no.
In my opinion, YES :)

[SomeGuyDude]

I wouldn't, if it can be helped, try to replace the ram youself, laptops tend to be very squashed together inside, and if you don't know what you are doing you can make it very hard to get the case back together.

I gotta say that this just ain't entirely correct.

Most modern laptops don't "open" like a desktop. On the bottom there's just a bunch of little covers like the battery cover on a remote control. One will have memory and only memory inside. Unscrew that and you'll see sticks usually with two pieces of plastic on either side. You put the stick in at a slight angle until it can't go in any further, then put it so it's horizontal until it "clicks". Process takes about a minute and a half depending on how slow you are with a screwdriver.

Things are tight, but I have essential tremors and I can do it.

[Solicitous]

Will it void the warranty? Well if a ram upgrade doesn't allow you to be covered under warranty, I wouldn't tell them about the ram upgrade, and should the laptop need to go and get repaired, I would just swap out your new ram and replace with the original.

In terms of speed boost, I used to have 512mb in my lappy, and I upgraded to 2gb (cheap as), and I've noticed a difference, enough to make me feel satisfied with the investment in buying extra ram anyways.

[ACMiller]

I recently upgraded my laptop (very similar specs to yours) from 512mb to 2gb, and wow it made a huge difference. I no longer use any of the swap (thus no delay when changing between programs etc) even when opening as many programs as possible!
I'm not experienced at all in upgrading, but I just ordered the memory from Crucial, looked up a few tuturials on upgrading on the internet, and then did it myself. In my experience it was easier than upgrading ram on a desktop.

Good luck

[tom66]

The case can be opened from the bottom - I know, because one of the panels fell off, accidentally (the screws were broken). The RAM is installed inside; and it would seem trivial to upgrade. I would just want to check about the warranty, as I've heard that Dell won't cover the new RAM (as it's not their fault if it dies) but they will still cover everything else (e.g. yet another component breaks).

[OffHand]

yes
no
yes

go for the 2 GB!