The depreciation of upgrades...

[RacingHistorian]

I've been building my own PCs since about 1996.  Other than laptops, I haven't purchased a 'name brand' PC since about 1995 when we bought a Compaq.  Anyways, I'm known for rebuilding my PC "all the time" as I've been into online computer gaming (mostly racing simulations) for over a decade and I use to run websites, write for a few, and write hardware & software reviews for magazines...  but I haven't rebuilt my current primary rig in 2 years.  It's still pretty modern with an Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 with 2gigs of ram and an ATI X1900XT 512mb Video Card.  But I went onto newegg.com and was looking around and other than perhaps a newer video card at some point - I still don't feel the need to upgrade much, although you can never have too much RAM.  So I pulled up my invoice from when I built this PC (I buy everything from newegg.com) and looked at the 2 gigs of RAM I purchased.  At that time it was $300 for the 2gigs.   I pulled it today, 2 gigs - EXACT same brand, modules, etc.    $69.00 with a $40.00 mail in rebate!   That's $29 for 2 gigs of RAM....            

[Yammer77]

new egg rocks....i have a faster machine now because its quad core then the duel core I bought in august.  oh and the new one is half the cost.

[leelf62]

Would the RAM from "egg" work with a Dell Inspiron dinasaur over 5 years old?

[RacingHistorian]

Would the RAM from "egg" work with a Dell Inspiron dinasaur over 5 years old?

I doubt the "same" RAM, as there are many different brands, speeds, and types of "RAM".  But I'm sure they have RAM that will work in your Inspiron.

[Yammer77]

go to crucial.com
they will scan your machine and tell you what you can get.
I've bought memory from them and highly recommend them.

[RacingHistorian]

go to crucial.com
they will scan your machine and tell you what you can get.
I've bought memory from them and highly recommend them.

I've always purchased Crucial as well, although the memory in my machine now happens to be Corsair PC2 6400 RAM.   

[leelf62]

I'm happy that Oly People band together!!   

[peachhead]

I'm another very happy Crucial.com buyer!!!!

Loretta

[RacingHistorian]

My 2GB came today from newegg.com.  I installed it (which brings me to 4GB RAM), added the 3GB switch to WinXP Pro Boot.ini (Like VISTA, XP only sees 3GB of the 4GB).   Adding the 3GB switch allows Photoshop, etc to use the full 3GB for virtual memory instead of just the standard 2GB.  I haven't tested Photoshop CS3 yet, but I noticed Lightroom is much smoother when I was jumping around folders and moving large batches of images.