Determine RAM specifications?

[Craig White]

On Wed, 2007-02-14 at 16:49 -0700, Alan Dayley wrote:
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> Alan Dayley wrote:
> > 
> > Woah!  Would you look at that!  Lots of information there.
> > 
> > Thanks, Craig.
> 
> Well, that is a very cool command.  But, the dmidecode project web site
> states that the program does not probe but only reports information that
> the BIOS provides.  My BIOS is not helpful for what I need.  The command
> "dmidecode -t 17" reports information for device type 17, which is
> memory.  My output reports "Speed: Unknown"  :^|
> 
> But, half my question was whether or not both memory sockets were
> populated.  It reports that the second bank is empty.  That is good news
> since I don't have to remove RAM to install more RAM.
> 
> The speed issue is important in my case because the dual channel support
> will only be possible if both sockets are populated with the same
> capacity and speed memory modules.  I want to buy a module that matches
> the one already installed.  The manufacturer specs show two possible
> speeds for this model.  I guess I'll have to open it up to physically
> inspect for the speed.
> 
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It occurs to me that the above post suggests that there is only 1 chip
installed and you want to pair it with another which is probably a bad
idea for DDR interleave. You always want to buy them as a pair from the
same stock/manufacturer and if necessary, put an unpaired DIMM in a bank
that doesn't have an interleave which of course, defeats interleave
benefits - thus, you may wish to remove the existing RAM if it is a
single DIMM.

Craig