RAM, Harddrives and Printers

[mvern2]

I got a couple questions!

1. I'm getting a new printer (upgrading from a Lexmark Z32) and i was looking a a few 'all-in-one printers' as i will going back to university for my second year. theres the HP's (pretty good all round), Canon (i like the inking system...saves money in da long run), and Lexmark (haven't had any problems with my Z32 so hoping for the same). i was thinking more along the lines of the Lezmark (Dell has an all-in-one which is just a lexmark printer with Dells name on it)(tech support would be the best id anything should happen). Any recommendations, personal experiences (good and bad), etc.!?

2. Harddrives...i curently have a Quantum Firebal 40 Gb and wanna get an 80 giger. i can get a Maxtor 7200 rpm for $130 (canadian funds) which is darn cheap. but i've heard such good things about WD's 80 gigers. Any recommendations, personal experiences (good and bad), etc.!?

3. RAM...i curently have a stick of 256 DDR PC2100 CL2.5. There is a marking with an "M" as a symbol (i have no idea who the manufacturer is) there is a code on my RAM module 'MT16VDDT3264AG-265A1'?

i can get a stick of 2100 DDR Crucial for $65 (canadian funds once again)

my mobo is a ASUS A7V 266 so the max it supports is 2100 so no use going hiher as i would like to build my own pc from da ground up in a year or so (money permitting ofcourse) so i don't need da best of da best.

Money is an issue for all the upgrades (less for the all-in-one as i would like that to last me for a while)

i'd appreciate your responses!

Thanx!

[mwkirchner]

Originally posted by mvern2
I got a couple questions!

1. I'm getting a new printer (upgrading from a Lexmark Z32) and i was looking a a few 'all-in-one printers' as i will going back to university for my second year. theres the HP's (pretty good all round), Canon (i like the inking system...saves money in da long run), and Lexmark (haven't had any problems with my Z32 so hoping for the same). i was thinking more along the lines of the Lezmark (Dell has an all-in-one which is just a lexmark printer with Dells name on it)(tech support would be the best id anything should happen). Any recommendations, personal experiences (good and bad), etc.!?

Personally I am not a big fan of the "all in ones". The reason is that if something goes wrong with it ... you may end up having to scrap it due to the cost of repairing it. If you had 3 separate items ... it would be easier to replace one piece.

2. Harddrives...i curently have a Quantum Firebal 40 Gb and wanna get an 80 giger. i can get a Maxtor 7200 rpm for $130 (canadian funds) which is darn cheap. but i've heard such good things about WD's 80 gigers. Any recommendations, personal experiences (good and bad), etc.!?

I run Maxtor drives and do not have any problems with them. I have always run them. I am not saying that WD is not a good drive ... but I think that Maxtor gets a bad rap in here for some reason.

3. RAM...i curently have a stick of 256 DDR PC2100 CL2.5. There is a marking with an "M" as a symbol (i have no idea who the manufacturer is) there is a code on my RAM module 'MT16VDDT3264AG-265A1'?

The RAM is from Micron. I run Mushkin ... but Crucial is a good RAM also. I was running it in my old computer.

i can get a stick of 2100 DDR Crucial for $65 (canadian funds once again)

my mobo is a ASUS A7V 266 so the max it supports is 2100 so no use going hiher as i would like to build my own pc from da ground up in a year or so (money permitting ofcourse) so i don't need da best of da best.

Money is an issue for all the upgrades (less for the all-in-one as i would like that to last me for a while)

i'd appreciate your responses!

Thanx!

[Brk]

Originally posted by mvern2
I got a couple questions!

1. I'm getting a new printer (upgrading from a Lexmark Z32) and i was looking a a few 'all-in-one printers' as i will going back to university for my second year. theres the HP's (pretty good all round), Canon (i like the inking system...saves money in da long run), and Lexmark (haven't had any problems with my Z32 so hoping for the same). i was thinking more along the lines of the Lezmark (Dell has an all-in-one which is just a lexmark printer with Dells name on it)(tech support would be the best id anything should happen). Any recommendations, personal experiences (good and bad), etc.!?

2. Harddrives...i curently have a Quantum Firebal 40 Gb and wanna get an 80 giger. i can get a Maxtor 7200 rpm for $130 (canadian funds) which is darn cheap. but i've heard such good things about WD's 80 gigers. Any recommendations, personal experiences (good and bad), etc.!?

3. RAM...i curently have a stick of 256 DDR PC2100 CL2.5. There is a marking with an "M" as a symbol (i have no idea who the manufacturer is) there is a code on my RAM module 'MT16VDDT3264AG-265A1'?

i can get a stick of 2100 DDR Crucial for $65 (canadian funds once again)

my mobo is a ASUS A7V 266 so the max it supports is 2100 so no use going hiher as i would like to build my own pc from da ground up in a year or so (money permitting ofcourse) so i don't need da best of da best.

Money is an issue for all the upgrades (less for the all-in-one as i would like that to last me for a while)

i'd appreciate your responses!

Thanx!

2. Get the Western Digital 800JB (80 GB w/8 MB cache). It comes with a 3-year warranty.

3. Your RAM is by Micron and common in OEM computers (i.e., HP, Dell, etc.). Crucial is a division of Micron, so that shouldn't be a problem. However...get the same speed (CL2.5) for the new stick of RAM, since it'll run at whichever speed is slower anyway.

[mvern2]

Personally I am not a big fan of the "all in ones". The reason is that is something goes wrong with it ... you may end up having to scrap it due to the cost of repairing it. If you had 3 separate items ... it would be easier to replace one piece.

Thats why i was thinking of getting the Dell one cuz if anything does go wrong then they can take care of it for me. I would go with the 3 different devices but i don't have that kind of money on me.

[YeOldeStonecat]

I'm partial to HP...pay a bit more, but ya get what ya pay for.

Maxtor, tis the most replaced brand I work on (meaning take out and throw in the garbage). WD nice and reliable, their SE and Raptor drives fly. I'm also partial to Seagate Barracuda drives. Again, ya get what ya pay for.

Micron/Crucial RAM...love it.

[mvern2]

pertaining to the RAM....my mobo' manual (ASUS A7V 266) said that it supporst 2.5 Volt unbuffered/registered DDR SDRAM and that they support non-ECC memory

i'm just curious what the difference is between unbuffered/registered non-ECC memory and buffered/non-registered ECC memory (PC2100)