Funky Sawtooth motherboard, RAM opinions wanted

[GeeYouEye]

I need to make a Sawtooth last for the next 1 or 2 OS revisions. I've gotten to buying a video card (2x/4x version of the ATi 9800 Pro Mac Edition), and I need to put in more RAM. Here's the catch: the motherboard is unstable (hard crashes and freezes in OS 9, frequent KP's in X) with RAM in the second slot. Can I put RAM in only the 1st and 3rd slots, or do I need to fill them sequentially (and thus I should look to get a 1 GB DIMM)? Also, will a 1GB ECC registered DIMM work, or would I need to get non-ECC? For some reason ECC is much cheaper at that capacity in PC133 these days.

 

[Sherman Homan]

You mention PC133 and putting ram in the first and third slots... the Sawtooth had four slots and used PC100 chips. It should go to 2 gigs under OS X, even though System 9 would only go to 1.5 gigs. You can mix chip capacities in any slot. In any event, did you do the PMU reset? That can solve a lot of problems.

 

[GeeYouEye]

You mention PC133 and putting ram in the first and third slots... the Sawtooth had four slots and used PC100 chips. It should go to 2 gigs under OS X, even though System 9 would only go to 1.5 gigs. You can mix chip capacities in any slot. In any event, did you do the PMU reset? That can solve a lot of problems.

I know it's PC100, but you can run faster memory in a slower system, it just won't run at the rated speed. Besides, PC133 is cheaper. Did PMU reset, among other things. Wouldn't even boot the diagnostic CD with a stick in the second slot. I just didn't want to damage anything if they need to be installed sequentially. It seems that there's no non-ECC PC100 RAM at 1 GB.

 

[Sherman Homan]

I know it's PC100, but you can run faster memory in a slower system, it just won't run at the rated speed.

True that, my question was really about the fourth ram slot. You can mix 'em up, no problem.

 

[GeeYouEye]

True that, my question was really about the fourth ram slot. You can mix 'em up, no problem.

Excellent, I'll test it out, and see if I can't get 1.5 GB in there.