This site was created for a Triangle WebGrrls meeting on Canada Day (July 1), 1997. The whole day has been overshadowed a lot by the whole Hong Kong thing but we'll deal, because we all know the most important thing today is my presentation.

This site is mostly links to various sites that explain things much better than I ever could. ;-)

Memory, turn your Face to the moonlight...

First, think of Steve Page's rendition of it at The Big Shindig, and not Betty Buckley's version. You'll Feel better.

There are several different types of memory, and it can get to be a bear. So, a quick memory dictionary:

RAM
Random Access Memory; the stuff Microsoft and Intel want you to have lots and lots of. This is the part of your memory that you have control over. Generally these days machines come with 8 or 16 megs 'onboard'. It's generally going to take the 6-8 megs to run the operating system (before Win95 and MacOS 7.5, it took about 3-4 megs, so back then, you got 8 meg machines. Right now on my Mac here, the system is taking 7.5 megs on it's own.)

SIMMs and DIMMs
Single Inline Memory Module and Double Inline Memory Module. Recent PowerPC chips (pretty much anything found in a windows machine, and macs after the 7500) use DIMMs. I'm not sure how widespread DIMM use is on Intel machines yet; it seems almost random to me.

72 pin and 30 pin
This is the number of pins at the bottom of the memory module. You can tell what you need by looking at your machine's slots; 30-pin memory is about 3", 72 is about 4".

Where can you get information online?

  • An excellent FAQ from the Chip Merchant
  • Installing in a Mac, Presario, laptop or something funky like a printer or keyboard? It can be tricky. Luckily, the Chip Merchant also provides some excellent Technical Specs. I've used the PowerMac 7100 instructions, and so has a friend of mine who had never opened her computer before, quite successfully. The way I found the page a few months ago was a search on Alta Vista for the words: installing memory in a powermac 7100.
  • Good places to shop for memory:
    • The Chip Merchant has good prices if you're not looking for parity memory.
    • Onsale an online auction stuff, has daily auctions these days, and good prices if you're patient (I paid $35 each for 8 meg parity SIMMs last week).
    • If you don't mind used equipment (and I sure don't ;-) check out DataPath. They have decent prices on used memory.

    SCSI and IDE

    Ok. Big topic to cover, so again, you'll get a lot of links to explore later on, and an overview. Enjoy the chicken? Good.

    Ok, let's dig in here. Generally, a SCSI device is going to cost more. And it'll go faster. Iomega claims the transfer rate on the SCSI Zip drive is about 6 times the transfer rate on the serial port one. Through the serial port, I can believe it. However, SCSI drives do have a faster transfer rate over IDE stuff. The problem, for PC users, is what a bitch it is to connect SCSI stuff to a computer. Basically, you need a) a new card for the interface; b) a lot of time. It took me about 3 days to get my stuff working, but that's partly because my SCSI card wanted to be everything; it was supposed to handle IDE stuff, too, and add a new serial port to boot, and I had IRQ conflicts all over.
    Stephanie's Tip: when dealing with wanky boards like this, I suggest you do what I did in this case: I disabled everything, and then started re-enabling a step at a time.

    • There's a fabulously straightforward explanation of the drive types at Tom's Hardware Guide, that we'll go through.

    Linux Stuff

    First rule if you're putting together a Linux machine: avoid Win95 specific plug-n-pray devices at all costs. Thank you. I'm afraid I wasn't able to find a lot of info about this, but I know that the built in device stuff that makes the drives and such 'plug'n'play' seems to interfere with it working well with Linux and often with DOS. I will look into this more and update this page accordingly.

    How to Deal With Used Equipment and the Folks Behind it.

    1. If you can, buy your first thing through a third party, like Onsale. I purchased my main computer through them from DataPath. I knew that Onsale would provide me with protection if something went wrong, and now that I know what to expect from DataPath, I feel comfortable buying from them.
    2. On the other hand, I recently bought a used Newton from The Newton Store and afterwards I was rather disappointed with it...they didn't ship me a pen with the machine, and then tried to tell me it would be a few weeks to ship me one. Dustin's Newton from them had OS problems, too. I didn't buy through a third site, and so my recourses could have been few. I would have had more, because I am Canadian, and I could have used the legal system back home, however, if Dustin hadn't been able to fix his problem independantly, he could have had problems.
    3. Insist on a return policy. I flat out refuse to buy from anyone who won't take it back if it doesn't work. And try for at least 90 days; hardware problems often take that long or longer to emerge, as in the case of my zip drive.
    4. Listen for recommendations, and ask people to describe their whole experience. In my case with the machine from Datapath, I had fewer problems because I am very technical, and I expected to spend a weekend with the machine. But what I did with my machine may not be something you are up to doing; you may not have the time, the tech knowledge, or even the basic hardware for backup.
    5. Make sure they have more product on hand than they are selling, so they can do returns.
    6. Be firm but polite. Know what you want. If they sell you a lemon, make sure they know they don't get to get away with it.
      This is going to be a living document, with new stuff added constantly. If you have any more questions, please send them to me at thespian@sleepingcat.com and I will do my best to provide links and info. I will be doing more Linux/UNIX info later on, especially once I get a good box to Linux myself. (is it just me, or is Linux a good 'smurf word'? It's a noun, it's a verb.....)