CAPTAIN SLINKY SLINKALERT GOING OUT TO ALL ACTIVE SLINKATEERS

[captain_slinky]

HELP! I want to upgrade my brother's memory on The Dell Laptop You See Listed At This Link, but I have no idea which one to buy! It's gonna come with 1.0GB, DDR2-533 SDRAM, 2 DIMMS (probably 2 512MB sticks), I'd like to upgrade him to 2GB. Unfortunatley, that's all I've got... "1.0GB, DDR2-533 SDRAM, 2 DIMMS". If anybody can help out their beloved Cap'n here by showing me the lowest-priced way of doing this, I'd be much abliged!

Comments

[collisions.livejournal.com]

Honestly, I think it's worth $130 (see below about needing to get the 1GB stick version rather than the 2x512MB sticks version) to get $100 of memory stuck in the thing. First of all, you're getting a known-good and tested configuration - they stick it in at the factory and give it to you warranting that it all works together. Second, you don't have to screw around with 2 vendors, each of whom will point the finger at the other if something goes wonky (memory doesn't work, it seems to work but you get lots of system errors after the install, etc.--all of which are not uncommon when you try to match up 3rd party memory to a new system). Third, you may invalidate the warranty if you buy third party memory and/or install it yourself--Dell used to be horrible for that in the desktop space, and although they improved, vendors tend to be more of a bother about laptops.

Aaaanyway, I think you are not saving him much money. Even if you charged him exactly what Dell would to do the job, you wouldn't make enough after shipping to make up for the risk of nonsense. And if you don't charge him anything, you're taking on risk you don't need.

That's just my input after having done what you are proposing for random clients for years. Dicking around with upgrades for new gear (as opposed to buying it upgraded) is hardly ever worth it.

[captain-slinky.livejournal.com]

Hmmmmmmm... excellent opinion. I think that's the way I'll go. This way I won't be the one who rok Butchie' new laptop! Thanks!