Chapter -3

RAM

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Overview
• In this chapter, you will learn how to

– Identify the different types of RAM packaging

– Explain the varieties of DRAM

– Install RAM properly

– Perform basic RAM troubleshooting

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
 DRAM

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 DRAM
• DRAM (dynamic random access
memory) is the most popular type of
electronic memory
– Special type of semiconductor that
stores ones and zeroes
using microscopic capacitors
and transistors

– Single chip can hold millions of these

capacitor/transistor combinations

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Program Execution

• Program code is copied from your hard

disk into RAM before it is executed
1011 0101
1100 1010
1001 1111
1100 0111
1101 1101
0001 1101
1011 0110
1001 0001

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Organizing DRAM
• DRAM is considered the standard
– Low cost, high speed, and able to store data
in a relatively small package
– Many varieties of DRAM
• DRAM stores programs and data in 8-bit
(1-byte) chunks of memory
• Chips have historically been referenced
with respect to their depth and width
– 1 MB x 4
– 256 K x 1
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
 Organizing DRAM
• The depth and width are measured in
units of bits
• Not easy to determine based on what’s
written on chips
• The physical size and the internal
organization of the chip are not directly
related

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Review: Memory Controller Chip

• The memory controller chip (MCC)

device facilitates the flow of data from
the RAM to the CPU
MCC

• Data is placed on the external data bus

• Width of data bus related

to width or DRAM

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Practical DRAM

• 8086 used 16-bit data bus

– Much more expensive at the time
– At $12,000 per PC, would not have fueled the
PC revolution
• Original 8088 chip used 8-bit data bus
– Market was ready for this
– Adapted to some commands needing 16 bits

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Bus Review
• Address bus
– This addresses the RAM
– Number of lines in address bus determines max RAM
(32 lines = 4 GB, 36 lines = 64 GB)
• External data bus
– This is where data is placed once addressed
– MCC retrieves data from RAM on places on EDB
– Width of data bus dictates width of RAM
• Frontside bus
– Same as external data bus
• Backside bus
– Used to access cache
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
 DRAM Sticks

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 72-pin SIMMs

• A better solution was needed

• 72-pin SIMMs
– Modern CPUs have 64-bit external data buses
– 72-pin SIMMs have a notch in the middle
– Each 72-pin SIMM is 32 bits wide (two required)

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Banking
• Combining the widths of DRAM to match
the width of the external data bus is called
banking
• The number of sticks that make up a bank
depends on the chipset, which in turn
depends on the CPU’s external data bus
size
– EDB of 64 bits = 2 SIMMS 32 bits wide
– EDB of 64 bits = 1 DIMM 64 bits wide

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Consumer RAM

• RAM has widths larger than bytes

– 8 bits wide = byte
– 16 bits wide = word
– 32 bits wide = double word

• However, still referred to in bytes

– 256 MB, 512 MB, 1 GB sticks

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Essentials: Types of RAM

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 DIMM (Dual Inline Memory
Module)
• The 168-pin DIMM is the most popular
DRAM package in use today
– Extra pins to handle functions such as buffering
and ECC
– 144-pin SO-DIMMs (small outline) are used in
laptops

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 SDRAM
• SDRAM (synchronous dynamic RAM) are
tied to the system clocks
– Synchronized with system clock
– SDRAM is always a DIMM, but a DIMM isn’t
always SDRAM
– Wide number of pins
– Small-outline DIMM (SO-DIIMM) used on
laptops
– Faster than DRAMs

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 RDRAM
• RDRAM (Rambus DRAM) is a new type of
RAM
– Speeds of up to 800 MHz
– Comes on sticks called RIMMs
– 184-pin for desktops and 160-pin SO-RIMM for
laptops
– All slots must be populated: unused slots must
have a CRIMM (continuity RIMM)

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 DDR SDRAM -Double Data Rate
• DDR SDRAM doubles the throughput of
SDRAM
– 184-pin DIMM packages (desktops)
– 172-, 200-pin DIMM packages (laptops)
– Wide range of speeds
– Considered a standard today
– Dual slots are blue, third slot is black

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 DDR Speeds
Clock DDR Speed PC Speed Rating
Speed Rating
100 MHz DDR200 PC1600
133 MHz DDR266 PC2100
166 MHz DDR333 PC2700
200 MHz DDR400 PC3200
217 MHz DDR433 PC3500
233 MHz DDR466 PC3700
250 MHz DDR500 PC4000
275 MHz DDR550 PC4400
300 MHz DDR600 PC4800
• PC Speed Rating = Clock speed × 2 × 8
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
 Dual-Channel Architecture

• Dual-channel
architectures use two
sticks of RAM together
to increase throughput
– Similar to RAMBUS
• Works only if two sticks
– Dual slots often blue
– Third one often black

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 DDR2 SDRAM

• DDR SDRAM doubles the throughput of

SDRAM
– Doubled the clock, increasing buffering
– Does not speed up core RAM, but just the I/O
– 240-pin DIMM (not compatible with DDR)

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 DDR2 Speeds

Clock DDR I/O DDR Speed PC Speed Rating

Speed Speed Rating
100 MHz 200 MHz DDR2-400 PC2-3200
133 MHz 266 MHz DDR2-533 PC2-4200
166 MHz 333 MHz DDR2-667 PC2-5300
200 MHz 400 MHz DDR2-800 PC2-6400
250 MHz 500 MHz DDR2-1000 PC2-8000

• PC Speed Rating = Clock speed × 2 × 2 × 8

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Double-Sided DIMMS
• Almost all sticks come as
single-sided or double- sided
• Beware of double-sided sticks
– Some are thicker, which
prevents populating all slots
in some motherboards
– You motherboard may or
may not be able to accept
them.

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Latency
• Latency
– Measure of how slow RAM may be.

– CL2 refers to low latency. Faster.

It takes two clock cycles to get data.

– CL3 refers to high latency. Slower.

It takes three clock cycles to get data.

– Often listed as CAS (column address strobe).

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Parity and ECC
• Parity is a rudimentary method of checking the data to see if
errors exist
– No error correction, just detection
• ECC (error correction code) is a special type of RAM used by
high-end systems
– Major advance in error checking on DRAM
– Can also correct many errors
– RAM sticks of any size can use the ECC DRAM, but it is
most common as 168-pin DIMMs
– A motherboard must be designed to use ECC to take
advantage of the ECC RAM

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Buffered/Registered DRAM

• Most motherboards support only four

sticks of RAM
– More sticks present unique challenges

• To overcome output problems, sticks add

a buffering chip
– Acts as intermediary
between RAM and MCC

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Working with RAM

• What’s wrong with this picture?

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Working with RAM

• Avoid ESD damage

• Don’t touch pins or connectors directly

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Do You Need RAM?

• Two symptoms point to needing more

RAM
– General system sluggishness,
especially as more programs are opened
– Disk thrashing or excessive hard drive accessing,
caused by excessive paging

Note: Disk thrashing can also be caused by disk

fragmentation.

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Page File
• Data can be moved between physical RAM
and virtual RAM
– Data swapped in 64-K page blocks
– Too much too often causes disk thrashing
Physical RAM
Game
OS

Word Disk drive

Browser

E-mail

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 System RAM Recommendations
Operating Reasonable Solid Power User
System Minimum Performance
Windows 128 MB 256 MB 512 MB
2000
Windows 256 MB 512 MB 1 GB
XP
Windows 512 MB 1 GB 2 GB
Vista

• Actual minimum requirements are much lower

– Usually leads to slower computer and unhappy user

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Determining Current RAM

• My Computer
Properties
– Windows key-
Pause/Break key

• Task Manager
– Ctrl-Shift-Esc

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Getting the Right RAM
• Identify capacity
– What can the motherboard handle (look at the manual)
• Identify empty slots
– If all slots filled, you’ll have to pull some out
– For example, pull out 256-MB sticks to add 512-MB
sticks
• CPU-Z is a great tool to determine what you have
– Also shows latency

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Mixing and Matching
• Mixing DRAM speeds can cause the system to
lock up, leading to data corruption

• You can use faster DRAM than the

motherboard recommends, but you won’t see
an increase in performance

• You can put different speeds of DRAM in

different banks as long as they are both faster
than the speed specified

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Installing DIMMs

• Swing the side tabs away from upright.

• Push the DIMM down somewhat hard.

The two tabs should move back into
place

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Memory Details
• Signal presence detect (SPD)
– Reports the size, speed, data width, and voltage of the
installed RAM to the BIOS
– Can be read from BIOS
– CPU-Z shows SPD data
• The RAM count
– Part of Power On Self Test
– Counts addressable RAM and reports it
– Remember the subtle differences between counting in
binary and decimal
512 MB does not equal 512 million exactly.

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Installing SO-DIMMs in Laptops
• Make sure the system is
off
– No AC connection
– Remove all batteries
• Remove the panel or lift
the keyboard
• Slide the pins into
position and then snap
the SO-DIMM down into
the retaining clips

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 IT Technician

Troubleshooting RAM

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Memory Errors
• Appear as
– Parity errors, ECC error messages, system
lockups, page faults, and BSoD
• Real memory errors
– “Parity error at xxxxx”
– If xxxxx is consistently the same, you have a
bad RAM stick
• Phantom errors
– Random memory addresses
– Due to power issues, dust, heat
© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
 Check the RAM

• A halt before the RAM check could indicate

improperly installed RAM

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved
 Testing RAM

• Hardware RAM testing devices can be used to

troubleshoot errors

• An economical option is to replace the existing

sticks with new ones

• Memtest32 is a freeware tool that can be used

to test RAM

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved

 Beyond A+

• To get the graphics response needed,

games need powerful video cards and
video RAM

• Watch video cards to see

where RAM is headed

© 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved