One of the best ways to perk up the performance of an older laptop is by increasing its memory. Most of the time, the process of adding RAM is little harder than changing a light bulb. But not every laptop is easy to upgrade, and some modern thin-and-light units can't be upgraded at all?you have to buy the laptop with as much memory as you expect to need for its lifetime. Here's a primer to upgrading your laptop with additional RAM.
Can You Upgrade?
The first thing to do when you're considering a memory upgrade is to verify that your laptop supports it. Then you need to determine how much memory you can add. Typically your BIOS and motherboard constrain the amount of RAM that you can add to your laptop. Every model is different, so consult your user's guide, search the Web, and read up on your laptop's specs at the vendor's website to figure out whether you can safely increase the amount of memory on your machine. While you're doing this research, identify the steps involved in opening your laptop case and swapping out the memory modules safely.
Next, you need to investigate how your currently installed memory is configured across the slots. For example, your laptop may have only two memory slots, both containing 256MB modules to achieve your system's current 512MB capacity. To get to 1GB, you would have to buy two 512MB modules. Alternatively, you might have a single 512MB module and an empty memeory slot, in which case you would need to add a second 512MB module to reach 1GB.
Last but not least, you need to know the type of memory that your laptop uses?PC133, DDR, DDR2, DDR3, or whatever?and its speed. Your laptop's documentation should contain this info, but you can also find it on the startup screen. If you don't see it, try pressing the Pause, Break, or Tab key while your system is booting, to freeze the boot or show the boot info. You can also find the memory type in the BIOS. Most often, you must press Delete, F2, or another function key early in the boot process in order to enter the BIOS.
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