PC2100 vs. PC2700 vs. PC3200

Question

Level 1

10 points

PC2100 vs. PC2700 vs. PC3200

Hello -- stupid question for the savvy, but i'm trying to figure out if I should be purchasing the PC2100, the PC2700 or the PC3200 for my Power Mac G4 MDD Dual 867 MHz. I raise this question because after reading a previous post on upgrading this machine, a recommendation was made to go to Crucial. That company lists both the PC2700 model of 512MB and the PC3200 as being compatible with my CPU. However, no other company did... including apple. Is PC3200 really compatible? And if so, is it better? My understanding of memory was that when selecting the PC100 etc. value, you should coordinate it to your Bus speed. My computers bus speed is 133MHz. Therefore, should it not make sense to stick with the PC2100? Or should I upgrade -- how would I benefit from upgrading? Thanks!

Jason

Power Mac G4 MDD/Dual 867 & Powerbook G4 1.67GHz 15" Mac OS X (10.3.9) MDD G4 - running low on PC100 256MB; Powerbook G4 running low on 512MB

Posted on Sep 7, 2006 11:05 AM

Reply

Answer 1

a brody

Level 10

85,308 points

Sep 7, 2006 12:02 PM in response to JCnSF

Generally speaking you should only buy RAM that is exactly the same as Apple specs for your Mac:

http://www.info.apple.com/support/applespec.html

Exceeding specs is generally not recommended because Mac OS X has a lot of issues with RAM when it isn't to spec. They can range from timing to bad memory circuits that can be hard to diagnose as this series of posts demonstrates:

http://www.macintouch.com/badram01.html

Reply

Answer 2

The hatter

Level 9

61,031 points

Sep 7, 2006 12:38 PM in response to a brody

Crucial recommend(s) (ed) using PC2700 instead of PC2100 because it is built to higher spec and fewer issues. And rather than build for a small segment of the market, PC2700 is fully backward compatible. Same with many (but not all) PC3200.

We saw the same thing with PC100/PC133 happen to SDRAM.

PC100 could also work in PC66 systems, but a lot of the PC100/133 would not.

Below spec, marginal RAM, that is a problem. And always run Memtest (or Rember) afterwards. Also glance through MacIntouch's Bad RAM report.

My MDD came with Micron, and the 512MB I added from Crucial were exactly the same - I have no trouble recommending them, knowing also that they are easy to work with and work closely with Apple (like the RAM in my MacPro).

Reply

Answer 3

JCnSF Author

Level 1

10 points

Sep 7, 2006 1:01 PM in response to JCnSF

Thanks all... Crucial it is 🙂

Jason

Reply

Answer 4

a brody

Level 10

85,308 points

Sep 7, 2006 1:09 PM in response to JCnSF

Note, if it exceeds spec and something goes wrong, you probably will be on your own. However, that computer is so far off warranty, it may not hurt taking the risk as long as your data is backed up.

Reply