Laptop RAM questions

[Ratdog]

My laptop is spec'd to use PC 5300 DDR2 SDRAM.  It has two slots, and total capacity is for 4096MB .  It came with 2048MB.  I have two 1GB sticks.

 

My question is this... Which is faster... PC5300 or PC6400, my laptop will run either one.
 

  

[Colin]

6400 should be faster BUT I doubt that you will notice any difference in normal every day use. If, however, you use a ram intensive programme like Photoshop then you may notice a slight difference. If it was me I would buy whichever is cheaper. Remember if you have a dual core processor you will need to have a pair of ram chips of the same size and type.

[Ratdog]

The difference in price for them is $25.00.  For that... I'll opt for the PC6400.  Yes, I do have a dual core, and was already planning on getting a pair of 2GB sticks. 

You don't think I'll see much of an improvement by doubling my RAM?

Thanks for the input... appreciate the reply. 

[Robert]

I actually would leave it alone because if you up grade and are using a 32 bit operating system such as windows XP or Vista you will only show 3075 megs of ram not 4 so it will be a waste of money if you are trying  to increase memory for speed. It cannot be overcome because its the way the operating system sees the memory because its 32 bit. If you had a 64 bit operating system then you can get 4 megs and it will see it. Also the 6400 is faster, will you notice probably not, you would do better to leave it alone and get a new computer. One of my computers I have Windows 7 64 and 9 gigs of ram. If you do upgrade you want to buy all the sticks of the same memory type and brand its not good to mix and match. Sometimes the system will do funny things or will not boot plus it will default to the slower memory. I know you have a dual core and if you want to gain speed maybe you could upgrade to the next faster chip its not expensive and its not hard.

[Ratdog]

My version of Vista will run in 64 bit.  Infact... it previously WAS in 64 bit mode... and it was REALLY slow.  I am aware of the 3075MB issue in 32 bit.  Thanks.

[Robert]

Never been a fan of Vista bought a computer and bought xp and installed that and got rid of the Vista. If you like Vista you may really like 7 and its alot faster. You may have all the Aero features enabled on your Vista machine and that makes the thing really slooooowwww. Even with Windows 7 and I7 processor I shut down most of the aero features. On Windows 7 it doesn't seem to make that much of a difference to be in Aero mode it could be the 8 cores. But I never really liked all the fade and garbage that comes with Aero. One of the slow problems may be that the dual core in 64 didnt seem that fast but I really didnt have enough time to experiment with it so Im not sure. The one that had the Vista on it is a Q6600 4 core chip and it still was slow, that is until I switched to XP on that one.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116758
If you feel the need for speed switching to 7 may help and at 139 for either 32 or 64 it wont break the bank.

[Ratdog]

I've got no beef with my laptop (Vista), other than when I installed Office 2007... "Outlook" would not "recognize" and I ended up having to live with Windows Mail instead.  And, no... it wasn't a pirated version either... it came right from the Microsoft store.  No stability issues to date. 

I'm not certain how it ended up being in 64 bit mode, but when I switched it to 32 bit mode, life got "more gooder" in a hurry.  As long as this one keeps working for me, I'm in no hurry to buy a new one.

[ArmyValker]

I'd max out the ram and upgrade to windows 7. It blows away Vista in every aspect.

[Clark]

just love my WEBTV

[Westernbiker]

just love my WEBTV

Zip it Clark!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!