Hey everyone, I have a Dell Dimension 3000 computer which has two 256 sticks on PC 2700.

My dad's upgrading his system downstairs, and has two 512 high performence level 2 cas 2 ram sticks available for me.

We were both wondering if I'd be able to put the RAM in my computer, and, if I'd be able to reap the rewards of the high performence like my dad did...

Thanks in advance =D

.nICK.f.

Well, with such low memory sizes as 512 and 1GB RAM, the amount of RAM is more important that the speed/performance. I assume that by Level 2 RAM, you mean 2T Command. Well, the optimal timings for DDR1 (the ones that everyone used to strive for back in the day) are 2-2-2-5 1T. So I'm guessing that your Dad's RAM is either 2-2-2-5 2T or 2-2-2-6 2T. Either way, the 2T vs 1T is a much more noticeable performance difference than changing the timings.

So since I don't know enough about your RAM in your current setup, I can say if your Dad's RAM is higher performance than yours, but I can say that even if it was PC2100 3-4-4-8 2T (terrible) it would still be better than what you have because the performance difference between 512MB and 1GB is truly vast. So you should definitely upgrade regardless of the performance level of the other RAM. Just make sure that you use either your current 256 sticks or you Dad's 512 sticks, but not all 4 sticks.

Yea, correct, it's Mushkin 2-2-2-5 1T. My dad was thinking exactly the same lines as you in regard to upgrading to 1GB from 512Mb but wasn't sure if plugging a PC2100 stick into a PC2700 slot was hardware compatable. Figured so but wanted to make sure before hurting the system or frying the stick.

Cool man, thanks for quick response.

.nICK.f.

please read the updating ram guide in the guides forum.
In the future check the faqs and guides.
running mixed speed ram will result in it running at the slowest speed if it works at all.