Gateway Parts

My New Memory chip won't work???? PLS HELP!!!!?

HI. I have a compaq armada notebook. Its a 500mhz pentium III The memory requirements are for a 144 pin dramm sodimm chip, 3.3 volt, 100 speed, parity is not supported. the computer can handle up to a max of 2 chips, each 256 meg. When I bought the computer, it came with 64 MB memory. The memory chip itself is a toshiba, has 2 chips on it, and is labled: 8*64 sdram 100pc. This chip will work fine in either memory bank on its own. I bought a new memory chip recenly. Its a toshiba, with 4 chips, labled 16*64 sdram. speed is not printed on the chip, but the part number is: T8z93-80, which is officially a 100 speed sodimm sdram chip. WHY does my computer give me an error message right at the post stating that an invalid memory chip is inserted?? Any help appreciated. I am thinking that maybe this new chip has a parity chip as one of the 4??maybe the voltage is wrong?? what exactly do 8*64 and 16m*64 mean?

Public Comments

1. I would look into the possibility that the voltage is different first, if it is not then it could be that you need 2 chips of the same size, meaning one old and one new won't work... (I don't think this will be the case) vaguly the 8*64 is the size of the ram chip, I can't recall exact details but its something like 8 channels of 64 megs of ram each... its hardware detail on the ram chip in any case stating the number of modules on the ram times the amout of memory per ram module which makes up the total amount of available ram... sorry I can't be more accurate. oh, and another possibility could be that the bios on the laptop is too old and dosen't recognise the newer ram chip properly, a last ditch effort might be to flash your bios or have it done since if something goes wrong you could fry your computer
2. Those terms describe the memory density of your RAM chips. If you are getting an error your system doesn't support that density OR the new chip is simply bad. Laptops are unfortunately very picky about RAM, especially older ones. To get RAM guaranteed to work try 4allmemory.com.