how easy is it to install memory

[Ace of Gold]

right now my laptop has 1G ram. i am looking to upgrade it to 2G taking out the 2 512MB sticks and putting in 2 1G sticks. How do i install it on my laptop, is it hard to do. should i pay the 30 dollers for them to install it. its a new laptop half a year old. what should i do.

 

[taper]

Usually not very hard. On mine it's just a couple screws to get at the slots. See if your manufacturer has a manual that'll show you what to do. I like running memtest86 after installing RAM, google it if you're interested.

 

[GenMarshall]

Depends on the make and model of your Laptop.

 

[Aramazd]

Should be fairly easy as long as you bought the right RAM. Not worth the 30 dollars to pay someone to install it.

 

[Ace of Gold]

Depends on the make and model of your Laptop.

its hp Pavilion dv6000t. like i said, a half a year old. I never took apart my computer before i never installed memory so i would not know what im doing. Like i said it would cost 30 dollers for best buy to install it.

 

[illram]

its hp Pavilion dv6000t. like i said, a half a year old. I never took apart my computer before i never installed memory so i would not know what im doing. Like i said it would cost 30 dollers for best buy to install it.

It's as simple as opening a small hatch on the bottom of the laptop, popping out the old memory and sticking in the new stick (or sticks). It takes about 1 minute, tops. The RAM is manufactured so that it only fits into your laptop in the correct manner, so you really can't screw up unless you try and force it in the wrong way. You can tell by looking at it which way it goes in, so you won't do that, trust me. Your owner's manual should tell you exactly where the hatch is that you need to take off, and it's probably labeled on the bottom of the laptop anyway.

A quick google search brought up these matches for new RAM sticks, make sure that's the correct model number for your laptop.

Of course, if $30 is worth your peace of mind then by all means do that, but replacing laptop RAM is one of the simplest hardware replacements you can do.

 

[GVBN]

Kinda silly to pay $30 for installing two $20 components. Installing RAM is easy and takes less than 2 minutes. Any DDR2 SO-DIMM 667mhz modules will do

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fubEPH0TBzI

 

[t0mme]

You might want to make a mental picture of how your current sticks are installed. The sticks have certain cutouts or holes, just insert the sticks in the same way your current ones are.
The most 'difficult' part is to find out which sticks you need. illram brought you up to speed quite nicely, but Crucial has a nice assistant tool as well, leading to this result. Quite pricey, but 2gb is easily recommended.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

You might want to make sure your laptop supports that much memory as well. Wouldn't be fun to find out you bought a useless stick of RAM.

 

[Chieftess]

Just remember that some PCs require that a pair of memory sticks need to be the same size. (i.e., slots 1 and 2 must both be 1 gig, not 1 gig and 512 mb.)