Re: Memory upgrades

[kflint@annihilist.com (Kim Flint)]

>Greetings loopsters,
>
>I have a technical question for the Oberheim-EDP savy among us.
>
>I have just taken delivery of a spankin' new pair of Obies and want to
>upgrade to the maximum amount of memory ASAP before I enshrine them in my
>rack. The mannual says it'll take either Mac or PC 30-pin SIMMs. Other
>"reliable" sources have told me that only Mac compatible SIMMS will do. 
>Which
>is it?

I think I can reliably answer this question.....

Pretty much any 30 pin simm should work. mac/pc, parity/non-parity, 2
chips, 3 chips, 8 chips, 9 chips, whatever. I tested a lot of different
simms and never had any problems. It just has to be either 256K, 1M, or 4M,
and be faster than 120ns. I haven't seen anything slower than 80ns in a
long time, so you shouldn't have to worry about that. oh, you have to
install them in pairs too.

4meg simms are less than $30 these days, so you should be able to max out
the memory on both your echoplexi for about $250.

Has anybody ever had problems with simms they bought? There are so many
sources and varieties that there could be some less than reliable
types/manufacturers out there. The echoplex was designed to be fairly
forgiving about this, so I would guess that problems are not too common. I
never really heard any complaints about it anyway.



>I have been looking around for the best prices on RAM. Some of the best 
>deals
>I've found come from independent computer techs. These guys offer a 
>dizzying
>array of stuff, and spout all sorts of unfamiliar terms like: parity or
>non-parity, mag+BP 4x3-6, 9 chip 4x9-7, etc, etc, etc.

You can also get used memory, which is even cheaper. Slightly risky I
guess, but people usually don't do anything too dramatic to their computer
memory.


>Being a Mac-only kind of guy (and usually buying only from the normal
>"MacMall" type catalogs) it's a new, and to be quite honest, kinda 
>confusing
>area for me. To get the best price, I'm inclined to go with one of these 
>guys
>(who happens to be a friend of a friend). But, I know that if I order 
>wrong,
>it's unlikely that he'll let me return it (30-pin SIMMs are becoming 
>passe I
>guess). Is there anybody out there who knows the EDP and is also SIMM savy
>enough to help me sort this out authoratively?

There are some places that charge more but offer much higher quality and
reliability. Whatever is more important to you. I'd get the cheap stuff
myself.

kim

______________________________________________________________________
Kim Flint                   | Looper's Delight
kflint@annihilist.com       | http://www.annihilist.com/loop/loop.html
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