                           The Memory Factor

                                   By

                               Lee Bohan

     With  the  advent  of  much  new software, especially that for
     windows, it would be easy to think our machines  are  too  old
     and  slow to be of any use any more, more often than not, this
     is not the case. With memory now at it's cheapest price  ever,
     and  falling,  a  few extra megabytes may be the answer to all
     ills.

     Before  you start upgrading the memory of your machine, take a
     long hard look inside. An 8086 or even  80286  probably  don't
     have  any  SIMMS  slots  on  the mother board, so an expensive
     memory card is needed. When, however, a 386SX mother board can
     be bought for less  than  100  pounds,  then  this  is  almost
     certainly  the  cheapest  way  to go to enable easy to fit and
     cheap SIMMS to be used, as well as getting you a more powerful
     and versatile processor.

     Depending on if you have a 16 Bit computer (ie.  a  286  or  a
     386SX  -  a small minority of 286's are upgradable, though the
     worth of doing this is doubtful) or a 32 bit computer (ie.   a
     386DX  or  a  486  of  any type), the number of SIMMS used may
     differ. For the 16 Bit  machines,  memory  banks  will  be  in
     pairs, and as such, SIMMS must be inserted in two's. In 32 bit
     machines however, four must be used at a time. All this is due
     to   the   fact   that  a  SIMM  card  only  supports  8  bits
     configuration, with one parity bit, and  the  processor  needs
     RAM as wide as it's data bus.

     The  size  of the SIMMS available is wide in variety, but when
     we take into account that they must be at a good  price,  only
     1MB or 4MB ones seem a good buy. The street price for these is
     now  just over 20 each for the 1MB variety and around 85 for
     the 4MB.  As for the type, most PC's will require  the  9  bit
     type  so  as  to allow the parity check that is needed by most
     machines.  Lastly, as for the speed, unless you are offered  a
     really  exceptional deal, buy 70ns as even though your current
     machine may not require that speed,  they  are  then  a  sound
     investment for the future.

     As  new,  most  computers these days have either 2MB or 4MB of
     RAM.  Now, for running DOS programs  and  even  light  Windows
     work,  4MB  is enough, but 2MB, forget it! Now what I am about
     to suggest may not go down well in some quarters, but,  to  do
     any  serious  work  on your PC get at least 8MB. The 2 or more
     megabyte disk cache (there are many available) this will allow
     will breathe a new lease of life into the effective  speed  of
     your  hard  disk, and the sudden release from swapping to hard
     disk will make the machine seem to fly when in windows.

     For the real power user there is no substitute for RAM either.
     I am currently limping along with 4MB as I have only  4  slots
     left  on my 386DX, I have decided for forget going to 8MB, and
     add 4*4MB when I can afford  it  to  make  20MB.  Then  again,
     unless  you,  like  I, have designs on running OS/2 or UNIX on
     your PC something this drastic may not be needed.

     So before  you  throw  the  keyboard  through  the  window  in
     frustration,  do  the machine a favour, give it a chance, give
     it some RAM.

                         Lee Bohan - July 1992.



                                 Ends.
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