Support Computer Memory

Discussion in 'Technology' started by Amaury, Nov 29, 2013.

  1. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    I'm planning on getting more memory (RAM) with my birthday money from a while ago, but Nights was saying that, depending on the computer, you can only upgrade so high.

    Here are my specs:

    [​IMG]
     
  2. The Twin My, what a strange duet

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    What's your computer brand and model number? Most manufacturers will list on their sites or in product listings if the RAM is capable of being expanded. What you've listed isn't quite helpful for me.
     
  3. Technic☆Kitty Hmm

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    32 bit operating systems can only be upgraded to 4GB of RAM. Having said that, not all of that 4GB will be used. Your OS will actually only be able to use about 3.6GB of the RAM. To upgrade to a larger amount of RAM will require you to update your system to a 64 bit OS. This is common for all computers and operating systems. 32 bit simply cannot put that much memory to use.

    Hope this helped ^^
     
  4. Misty gimme kiss

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    Nights is right that a 32-bit OS can only address just shy of 4GB, so there's no reason to upgrade beyond that. Still, it would be a noticeable difference for you. The only other thing you need to be sure of is whether your motherboard will support more than 2GB (most likely) and what kind of RAM it accepts. To figure that out we'll need the model name & number of your mobo.
     
  5. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    Um, it was custom built, so I'm not sure where it would be. Do I need to open up the tower?
     
  6. Technic☆Kitty Hmm

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    Actually no, that's not necessary. There's a program that's freely available that will quickly and easily identify your motherboard model for you. The program is called CPU-Z and it is excellent for finding out information about your system. You can download the program here, just click on the big purple 'Download Now' button. Follow through the install and open the program. Once it's open you're going to want to go into the Mainboard tab. You'll need the two sets of numbers/letters next to 'Model'.

    Once you find this info post it here and I'm sure one of these other smarty pants (Misty >.>) will be able to help you identify if your system is capable of upgrading if I don't get to it first.

    Here's a screenshot to help you know exactly what you're looking for. Go ahead and let us know the manufacturer as well as the model numbers.

    Capture.PNG
     
  7. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    Oh, then I think the sticker on the side of the tower has it.

    0X5543.
     
  8. Technic☆Kitty Hmm

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    Gonna take a bit more than that. I'm sure there are a lot of model '0X5543's out there. We need both sets of numbers and the manufacturer would be a big help to identify your system. Try using the program I mentioned in my previous post.
     
  9. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    If the sticker was the model, it would have been wrong, anyway. I forgot about the new motherboard I got a long time ago.

    Anyway, I try to clean my tower on the 1st of each month, so I took a look at the motherboard when I did that earlier, and hopefully all this different info helps:

    • Gigabyte DX10.1
    • GA-MA785GT-UD3H
    • 20z Copper PCB PCI Express 2.0
    • AM3
    • SATA 2
    • 1394

    Here's a screenshot, although I don't think it's the exact same motherboard, but it should still help:

    [​IMG]
     
  10. Technic☆Kitty Hmm

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    Okay so I ran the serial and found the specs for your motherboard here. It is fully capable of supporting 4GB and can actually support up to 16GB of memory. You could install 16GB to take full advantage of your motherboard but you would have to update to a 64-bit version of windows 7. If you'd prefer to simply stay at a 32-bit then 4GB will work. Misty was right about it creating a noticeable difference in performance.

    A few things to note before/while updating the memory:
    • Check with the site I linked to for the specific RAM your mobo is compatible with.
    • Ensure you don't touch the RAM chips before you touch metal to ensure there is no static discharge.
    • Make sure you place the RAM in properly before plugging your system back in. If placed incorrectly it will destroy the RAM cards. You will know because they'll start smoking.
    That's about it. For reference, the numbers for your motherboard was the "GA-MA785GT-UD3H" that you listed. You might want to write that down or something.
     
  11. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    We'll be having professionals at the computer place do it, but thanks!
     
  12. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    So question: Will more RAM also make it so my computer's applications, such as Skype, don't have random temporary freeze-ups when I'm processing a video after recording with my capture card or when I'm saving a video on Windows Movie Maker?
     
  13. Misty gimme kiss

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    It's possible. It depends on the root of your issues, but RAM can't hurt. Having more RAM makes multi-tasking snappier, but if you're overusing your CPU or HDD, that's a separate problem.
     
  14. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    It doesn't look like I'm using that much CPU, and I'm not sure what HDD is.

    [​IMG]
     
  15. Misty gimme kiss

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    Check Task Manager when you have a lot of programs doing things at once & then see what it says.

    HDD would be... the way that hard drives work is it's a disk (like a CD) spinning. The spindle reads/writes data to it. If you're writing a lot of data (like rendering or recording video), you're using the disk (amongst other things). Depending on the speed of your hdd drive, that could be a cause for slowdown.
     
  16. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    I'll take a look at it later when I'm recording and saving more of my Kingdom Hearts: Re:Chain of Memories - Reverse/Rebirth walkthrough. :)

    As for the HDD, where can I check its usage?
     
  17. Misty gimme kiss

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    I don't use Windows 7 anymore so I can't check for myself (Windows 8 has a revamped Task Manager), but try the Resource Monitor button.
     
  18. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    [​IMG]
     
  19. Misty gimme kiss

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    Yeah, like I've said, you should look at it when you've got a lot of stuff open & see if it's maxing out.
     
  20. Amaury Legendary Hero

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    When I'm rendering a video, CPU usage fluctuates between 60% and 90%, although it'll sometimes randomly drop momentarily to around what showed in the screenshot.

    Here is a screenshot for the HDD:

    Graphs.png

    Edit - 11:41 PM PST: And my computer just crashed, so I guess no YouTube update tonight since it won't get done processing and saving in WMM in time. :x Anyway, I'm not sure if it was because of high CPU usage or because I just switched to Google Chrome. Does Google Chrome use more memory than Mozilla Firefox?

    I'm a little inclined to go with the latter because this never happened when I was using Mozilla Firefox and I was rendering a video.