Upgrading memory question.

I have a Dell Dimension 4400 that I bought new in 2002 At the time I bought it I "upgraded" the memory from 128 to 256 MB from the manufacturer. I see where the maximum I can go on this computer is 1GB.
I now want to install the maximum amount of memory I can which leads me to a question. I have read where you should install memory in pairs. There are 2 sockets on my computer. In researching memory upgrades I happen to come across a 1GB stick. Can I pull out the 2- 128MB sticks currently in my computer and install just the 1 GB stick of memory, or do I have to install 2 - 512 GB sticks of memory? I've noticed the 1 GB sticks of memory are less expensive than the 2- 512 MB sticks from the same manufacturer.
My computer takes PC-2100 DDR DIMM type memory if that helps.
Thank you.

Why not open your case and have a look at how many ram slots you have free? For a machine that's effectively end of life, you might find you can put 1 x 512 stick in to bring the total to 768mb and that could be enough. The references to installing memory in pairs refers to memory running at dual channel, you should check to see whether your motherboard supports this first, otherwise it won't make any difference. If you only have 2 slots which both currently have 128mb chips in them, your pc should be faster with 2 x 512mb than 1 x 1gb.

Go to Crucial.com and run their online scanner, some of the older boards will only support up to 512 per slot, so a 1 gB stick would be out of the question. Also be aware that 184 pin pc-2700 and pc-3200 are backwards compatible with pc-2100 and will work in your computer, you'll probably find better deals on the pc-3200 than you will on pc-2100.

Go to Crucial.com and run their online scanner

Bravo blazee, crucial.com is an American owned company and most of their memory is built right here in Idaho by my neighbors.

The online scanner works good but requires axtive-x when used with microsoft IE. For security reasons I would recomend using FireFox to acess their site, they have a downloadable scanning file for FireFox and other browsers that doesn't require active-x.

Go to Crucial.com and run their online scanner, some of the older boards will only support up to 512 per slot, so a 1 gB stick would be out of the question. Also be aware that 184 pin pc-2700 and pc-3200 are backwards compatible with pc-2100 and will work in your computer, you'll probably find better deals on the pc-3200 than you will on pc-2100.

Very good point:). OP can up to 3200, no sweat. Faster sticks, and two 512's work better than one 1G for that system, even though no dual-channel capability. The OP can go to 2G of 3200, but that's the absolute limit RAM for that mobo. Dell doesn't say it without some arm-twisting. :confused: dunno why Dell is so recalcitrant about some upgrades, well yeah I do.....but that's another topic, :wink: