nooby RAM question -.-

[Midge]

I'm looking to upgrade my PCs graphics card and RAM to (hopefully) improve performance a bit without breaking the bank on a whole new system (student debt ftw ; ; ).

My question is: my PC has 512MB RAM at the moment. I'm looking to double that to 1GB. I currently have 2x 256MB cards in there. What would be the best way to increase the RAM? another 2x 256 cards? a 512MB card + the original 256s? or just go with 2x 512?

I was told that RAM had to work in pairs (or something like that) but I thought I should check with people with a lot more know-how than myself.

Any input is greatly appreciated^^

P.s. the graphics card I am going for is a Nvidia 7600 GS. Are there any known issues with this card and FFXI? I know its not an awesome card but its reasonably priced and alot better than the 5200 I have now :D

[Fallso]

2X512s, usually there's only 2 ram slots on one motherboard. If you got spare money, get 1X1gig so you can upgrade at a later date to 2gig.

[Skyylya]

It depends on the MOBO, clearly it's better to get at least 1 gig, 2 gig if you can muster it is good to have.

Just make sure whatever you get is compatible, either 184 pin or 240 pin. Try to go with a good brand too like corsair or kingston, geil ultra is good and the last thing to check is make sure the mhz are good for your CPU/MOBO.

[Fallso]

Oh and remember DDR2 is better than DDR, etc.

[Midge]

Thanks for the responses^^

[Shuemue]

Run this: http://www.crucial.com/systemscanner/index.aspx

It'll tell you what you've got, what you can run and how many slots you have.

[Midge]

I cannibalised some RAM from a old PC yesterday. Fortunatley it was DDR like the memory I was already running but it was 400mhz as opposed to 200mhz I was running already.

Everything seemed to be ok yesterday (did beseiged and didn't have any problems) so I'll leave it like this for a few days and see if any problems crop up.

Thanks again for the help!