Mobo only supports 256mb RAM?

[Boboki]

I have an old k-6/2 350mhz IBM computer with some low level motherboard I know nothing about. When looking for the jumper settings so I could upgrade to the 550mhz proccesor, I came acrose a little line that says the mobos maximume memory is 256mb. The mobo has 2 SDRAM dimms that support PC100 only, and the system came with one stick of 64mb. Before I found this web site, I plugged in a stick of 256 RAM, and right now my windows shows I have 320mb RAM. Am I missing something? Have I been damaging my motherboard or some such thing by having that extra bit of 64mb?

Here are some links of my system in case that helps at all.

mother board specs (http://www.pc.ibm.com/qtechinfo/DETR-3VXM3D.html)

jumper settings (http://www.pc.ibm.com/qtechinfo/DETR-3WDHB9.html)

computer specs (http://www5.pc.ibm.com/us/products.nsf/$wwwpartnumlookup/_2153e4n#details)


Any information would be greatly appriciated.

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B-1

[borgdrone1of2]

hello
if it says it will only utiliz 256 than any more is just not used try a stick of 512 it will only use 256.
it might tell you you got 320 but but it cat use the extra.
this is the only one of your questions i have an answer for.
have a nice day

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resistance is invigorateing lol

[Rick]

If you look around.
Other Boards using that same chipset support 384 meg of ram
I’d do a little checking to see IF the chipset and cache memory support that much
A Few other boards with chipset show 640Meg ram supported.

You aren’t going to harm your system running the extra ram.
You could however be reducing the performance if the cache ram doesn’t support that amount

[mjc]

Some of the limits on memory were not real limits but were set by "common practice" or by cost factors....not that long age RAM was running over $1 a meg...so that would have been $256 for the memory, many of the lower end motherboards didn't really think it was a great idea to spend more on the RAM than the motherboard!

If it is recognised, it is being used...whether or not it is being used efficiently is a nother matter. The memory tests during POST test for the amount among the things that are tested.

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mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

[saphalline]

Sweet! I've never heard of anyone successfully using more RAM than their motherboard "officially" supported!

Ok, on a more serious note, if Windows is showing you 320 Megs of RAM than it has to be recognized and used by the motherboard (the POST is handled by the BIOS, which is a motherboard's personal software). If the chipset does indeed support more RAM than 256MB, then the others are probably right here, the mobo company decided for some reason or another not to officially support more than 256MB. Could be they never got around to fully testing it with more than 2 sticks of 128 Megs each; highly possible because of the aforementioned price of RAM in years past, they were trying to keep their budget down and never bothered to update the info lately.

None of that really matter, tho, 'cause its the chipset and the number of DIMM slots that ultimately determine max RAM capacity. If the chipset supports 256MB in one DIMM slot and your mobo has more than one DIMM slot, chances are you'll be able to run more than 256MB of RAM in your machine.

Historically speaking, you'd need to keep a PC around a long time to max out its RAM. Original Pentium machines, for instance, had a max RAM of 64MB which is not so hot today, but PentiumII machines usually have a max RAM of 256MB to 512MB which is pretty standard today. My mobo (Socket A) has a max RAM of 3GB! That's 3072MB! We'll probably have 15GHz processors before that becomes standard http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif.

[Boboki]

Jeese, a $1 a mb? I'm getting a 512mb DDR stick for my new computer and its only $120 !


Well, thank you everyone for answering my question. Its been quite a history lesson ^-^

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B-1