WTB: PC133 Desktop RAM - 512mb

[Wingnut]

I just bought an off lease IBM NetVista M41 desktop to replace my old Compaq Deskpro. According to IBM support, my machine takes PC133, CL2, non ecc, SDRAM. It has 3 slots and can max out at 1.5GB.

SO......if anyone has any desktop RAM that will fit/work, I am interested in buying some. I checked E-bay and the prices range from $20-60/stick.

Thanks for looking.

[Wingnut]

Bump

[Subliming]

I have a pair of exactly what you are looking for, two 512MB PC133 DIMMs, pulled from a Power Mac tower. Manufacturer is "Transcend" with cool hologram stickers.

I can take a picture of them if needed.

I see you are in Toronto as well!

[Wingnut]

Thanks for the reply. But I didn't think Mac parts were compatable with PC parts? In a lot of the E-bay auctions I skimed through looking for RAM, I saw a lot of "Not compatable with Mac" comments???

FWIW, the FRU for compatable RAM is 10k0061 & 10K0062

[tarvoke]

some mac firmware (bios) are asinine about memory timings, e.g. the machine wants the spd of the ram to have timings for pc100 / cl2. generally most pc133 / cl3 is fast enough to run at pc100 / cl2, but in some cases the spd chip of a pc133 stick does not actually contain timing for pc100 speeds. mac firmware checks this more rigorously, and will reject; which is dumb compared to pc bios which usually defaults to run the memory as 'auto' (well ok maybe not so much back in the pre-ddr days where some mainboards still used jumpers to set various frequencies)

I've even seen where the mac wants pc133 / cl3 and will refuse pc133 / cl2. 'cos, again, the spd doesn't actually have a timing for cl3 even tho the stick is obviously capable of it.

anyway long story short, Subliming's dimms will most likely work in your machine. if you're really concerned, check out the part number or sku or whatever and see if the mfgr specifies compatibility.

then again I did recently have a strange issue with a 1U ibm xSeries, where it would only boot if a certain pc133 stick was in the first of the 3 slots but not any other slot. go fig.