[WhiteKelso]

Hi geeks,

Been quite a while, but here I am again seeking the good geek minds. I actually have only 3 concerns:

1) I wish to upgrade my comp memory, which currently runs at 2 x 512mb on dual channel. I'm thinking of adding another 512mb, but I need your advice on which way I should go: buy a single 512 mb RAM or 2 x 256mb? If I buy 2 x 256mb, will it preserve my dual channel configuration?

2) My mobo supports SATA drives, but I'm currently using PATA (or non-SATA). I'm thinking of buying a SATA drive and transform my non-SATA into a slave drive. Is this possible? My non-SATA has a 200GB capacity and I'm planning to buy a 250Gb SATA drive.

3) If I buy a new drive, would I need to format it? Also, if I clone my old drive to the new drive and install the new drive as "master", will the new drive run my OS?

Selected computer specs: MOBO = ASUS P4P800SE; CPU = Intel Celeron; OS = WinXP

As always, I appreciate the geek opinion and expertise. Thanks very much.

WK

Edited by WhiteKelso, 17 July 2006 - 09:09 AM.

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Memory wise you are going to have to look at the memory configuration page on your motherboards manual to see what you can use an keep dual channel by keeping dual channel you may be negating the benefit by incurring the speed loss that maxing memory slots can sometimes have.

To get your SATA drive to work i think you may have to install the OS fresh if you want to use it as a primary as the OS installed on your IDE wont have SATA drivers. The new drive will need to be formatted but you can easilly do that with windows or a disk management and partitioning software like partition magic or the Gparted liveCDs. Unlike IDE SATA drives dont have jumpers so to boot from it you need to bios and adjust boot priorities.

[warriorscot]

Memory wise you are going to have to look at the memory configuration page on your motherboards manual to see what you can use an keep dual channel by keeping dual channel you may be negating the benefit by incurring the speed loss that maxing memory slots can sometimes have.

To get your SATA drive to work i think you may have to install the OS fresh if you want to use it as a primary as the OS installed on your IDE wont have SATA drivers. The new drive will need to be formatted but you can easilly do that with windows or a disk management and partitioning software like partition magic or the Gparted liveCDs. Unlike IDE SATA drives dont have jumpers so to boot from it you need to bios and adjust boot priorities.

[WhiteKelso]

thanks. much appreciated.