old dell question

darealtulip

A friend of mine has two very old dell comps. One is a Dell Dimension XPS T600 and the other one is a Dell Demension 2100.

Can I transfer the RAM from one to an other and in which one should I put it?

They are very old and slow, and yes I know she should probaly just build a new one but she doesn't need it for much. Only MS Office and even that is really really slow now.

W!zard

When was the last time the main company os (windows) was re-installed? If the os has not been wiped & reinstalled for years, this is likely why the system is very slow. Adding more ram is only a brief patch that might not work as well as a clean install. You Pc should have the install disks. Its the best way to give extra life to an old computer. It is not ideal but just giving you another option that will work with abit of pain involved. :rolleyes:

darealtulip

W!zard wrote: »

When was the last time the main company os (windows) was re-installed? If the os has not been wiped & reinstalled for years, this is likely why the system is very slow. Adding more ram is only a brief patch that might not work as well as a clean install. You Pc should have the install disks. Its the best way to give extra life to an old computer. It is not ideal but just giving you another option that will work with abit of pain involved. :rolleyes:

Yes totaly true, but it says the whole time that the vurtial memory is low, the whole 128 mb!! So it took about 1,5 hours to get office on! So I would like to take the RAM out of one to put in the other one to speed the installing process up a bit (and it probaly only will be a bit!)

Thanks for your very quick reply!

Solitaire

If the virtual memory is low she might be having an issue with her swapfile...

And I'm not sure if you can swap those DIMMs either. The XPS uses ECC PC100 SDRAM while the 2100 uses standard PC133 SDRAM.

darealtulip

Solitaire wrote: »

If the virtual memory is low she might be having an issue with her swapfile...

And I'm not sure if you can swap those DIMMs either. The XPS uses ECC PC100 SDRAM while the 2100 uses standard PC133 SDRAM.

How do I solve the problem with the swapfile?

Are you not sure and is it worth a try? (not really of course with that old sh*~e)

thanks for the reply!!!

Joeface

virtual memory what is it currently set at

darealtulip

Joeface wrote: »

virtual memory what is it currently set at

How do you mean 'set at'? It's 128 mb if that is what you mean? I really don't know much about these comps. I started building etc only 4 years ago so I am a bit of new to this.

docmol

Is the hard-drive full? Have you scandisked/defraged it? A full hard-drive will slow things down. Are you running antivirus software? If the computer is not on-line try uninstalling it. How much ram is actually on the pc? 128mb is pretty low. Whats the OS (win98/2000/xp)? If you don't have the original disks, and you can back-up your docs off the pc, a linux distro(like ubuntu) would make much more efficient use of your pc. 133mhz SDRAM will work in a pc with 100mhz SDRAM but not vice-versa.

darealtulip

docmol wrote: »

Is the hard-drive full? Have you scandisked/defraged it? A full hard-drive will slow things down. Are you running antivirus software? If the computer is not on-line try uninstalling it. How much ram is actually on the pc? 128mb is pretty low. Whats the OS (win98/2000/xp)? If you don't have the original disks, and you can back-up your docs off the pc, a linux distro(like ubuntu) would make much more efficient use of your pc. 133mhz SDRAM will work in a pc with 100mhz SDRAM but not vice-versa.

yeah did the scan disk and the defrag. They partionted the drive on 10gb of the whole 40 gb they have!

It's running on XP.

So take the ram out of the 2100 and put it in the XPS and it will work? excellent!

I was gonna reinstall the XP but it will be a lot better to put linux on then? I will start downloading.

Thanks a million every one it never ceasses to amaze me what you all know!!!

tpotter

So take the ram out of the 2100 and put it in the XPS and it will work? excellent!

Even if it doesn't work, you wont hurt anything. If it is incompatible, the computer will just beep when you turn it on without booting.

However, if later on you start to experience crashes, one of the first things you should do is remove the memory and see if that fixes it, because this could be the problem. It may be a good idea to mark it, so you can remember which one is which...

Solitaire

The problem is that the XPS usually uses memory with error-checking (i.e. server-style memory). Swapping it over to the 2100 won't work, and while you can put the memory from the 2100 in the XPS it won't run simultaneously alongside ECC RAM.

darealtulip

Solitaire wrote: »

The problem is that the XPS usually uses memory with error-checking (i.e. server-style memory). Swapping it over to the 2100 won't work, and while you can put the memory from the 2100 in the XPS it won't run simultaneously alongside ECC RAM.

And thus no improvement?

I hate old cr*p!!:mad:

Any thoughts on how to fix that swapfile you were on about a few post earlier?

Would a reinstall be the only thing I can do? Don't want to put to much time in it either.