[ale] OT: Rambus upgrade

[Grady Harris]

I bet the answer's in a real obvious place, but it hasn't been where I looked.
It sure doesn't seem to be with IBM e-mail support.

Some while ago, I bought an IBM Intellistation M Pro from their Clearance Corner
website. It was a decent deal deal for the time, & their local support during
the one incident I had while it was under warranty was astoundingly good.

However, I didn't think ahead far enough--this generation carries the accursed
Rambus memory--man, that stuff's expensive, and I need more, mostly to
accommodate programs that are built upon Eclipse.

Rambus, evidently, must be installed in matched pairs. Right now, the machine
has a pair of 128 MB installed, & two more slots beside those that are filled
with what look to be dummy placeholder cards, marked FOXCONN (motherboard
manufacturer).

I found a pair of 256 MB Rambus cards (sticks? thingies?) on eBay, pulled from a
working machine, it says. The seller seems to know what he's talking about, the
part number's right, & the price is pretty good (about $85 right now).

Does anybody know if you can mix pairs? That is, one pair of 128 MB & one pair
of 256 MB--or do all four have to be the same?

Given most of the prices I've found for this stuff, it would be more effective
to buy a new machine, but that kind of disposable goods thinking really grates
at me.

Grady Harris