My computer is about 4 or 5 years old and has a stick of Apacer 512mb PC2100 RAM in it. Today I went to best buy to use up my gift card on another stcick of 512mb RAM and the guy told me that any other RAM past PC2100 won't work, nor will DDR2. I'm not sure if what I have now is DDR2 or not but the guy said that if it's only PC2100 it just normal DDR. He said that only one stick will work for me at all and it's a backwards compatible Kingston ValueRAM KVR333/512R. Is that correct, am I limited to PC2100 or anything backwards compatible with it? How can I tell if what I bought is backwards compatible, it doesn't say anything on the packaging.

 

your is DDR memory , not DDR2. DDR are backward compatible. I usually get my memory from Newegg.com

 

Without getting to much into this...Forget about backwards compatble. You have DDR ram. This means that it is 182 pin. Its the form that fits your motherboard. As for pc2100 this determines you bus speed. AND you probably should only use another stick of 2100 so that the motherboard can work with the new stick.
Like the above post mentioned go to newegg.com. Cheapest place and fast shipping. Just order another stick of 512 DDR pc2100 and you will be fine.

 

Since your original memory was PC2100, its most likely that your motherboard was built to support that format, so you sorta have to get that, and plus, its better to get identical speed ram when going dual stick. O, and yes, PC2100 is DDR, not DDR2.

 

newegg.com ROCKS!

 

Well they don't make 2100 anymore so I went with backward compatible 2700. I had best buy reward zone money that was expiring soon so I decided to buy some RAM. Not from newegg...

 

if u get the 2700 and put it in. You'll only run the 2700 at 2100 since the other one is 2100. You won't get the full potential out of the memory but it'll work fine.

 

You don't have to order from them, but Crucial.com will tell you a LOT about what you need or can use.

 

Yup, I checked out crucial.com, that's a great source when you need some info on RAM.

 

Basically if you get PC2700 memory it will downclock to PC2100. get a stick from newegg and youll be good to go.

 

get a new computer

 

Just because they don't make the ram anymore doesn't mean you can't find it. Try newegg.com or tigerdirect.com. Try to keep the size (in MB) and manufacturer equivalent for each stick. It makes things work a lot more smoothly.

Here is links for your ram choices at each:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/category/category_slc.asp?CatId=548&Nav=|c:147|&Sort=3&Recs=10
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...ubCategory=147

 

Like I said, I had to buy it from Best Buy because I had reward zone coupons that were expiring soon.

 

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1051826244183

 

Eh, personally I'd still get it from online and find something else to buy at bestbuy with the coupons.