Laptop Ram Disk?

[secretagent]

Is there anything I can do with my 8 Gb's worth of DDR2 Laptop ram? I was reading up on making a ram disk, but it seems the ones I read only apply to desktops. Is there any way to do it with sticks of laptop ram? Is it useful for anything else? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance!

 

[eton975]

Just to be clear, you don't mean taking out the laptop RAM and putting it in a desktop? That won't work.

 

[corkyg]

eton975 is correct. Laptop RAM is in SODIMM format. Desktop RAM is in DIMM format. They are physically very different. If you want to create a RAM disk in a laptop with 8GB, that is a different matter. Please clarify.

 

[bononos]

What about sodimm-dimm socket adapters?
http://www.ebay.com/itm/2PCS-New-La...f5fec74&pid=100005&rk=1&rkt=1&sd=360707874578

DDR2 is old though.

 

[corkyg]

Definitely a consideration.

 

[Harvey]

If you are running a 64 bit OS, 8 GB of RAM is useful if you run RAM-intensive programs (Photoshop, etc.) or you need to keep multiple programs running at the same time. It saves the memory system from having to swap out file to "virtual memory," which is stored on your hard drive.

If you're running a 32 bit OS with onboard video, 4 GB is ideal. The OS can only "see" a little more than 3 GB, but the system can use the rest of the RAM for the video subsystem, instead of "borrowing" it from the RAM available to the OS.

If you want the speed of a RAM disk, invest in an SSD, and you'll have it.

 

[secretagent]

Yes, I am aware that laptop ram cannot be used in a desktop. I was wondering if I could use my spare laptop ram in my work laptop maybe. The sodimm to dimm solution is one way to do it, but I don't really want to use this ram in my desktop. I already have 16Gb in that one, which is more than enough for me. My laptop has only 4Gb though, and I would like to use my extra ram in it, but the problem is that it's the wrong type of ram, the notch in in a completely different spot than the notch on my extra sticks. Is there some kind of external or internal adaptor that I can use?

 

[Sabrewings]

If the notches are wrong it's probably the wrong generation RAM.

 

[Harvey]

Check the manufacturers' sites for your two laptops to see what type and speed the RAM each uses. If you can't find it, search Google for the models of the RAM in the machines, and you'll know what you have and how interchangeable it is.

I doubt whether you'll find any laptops that can accept more than 8 GB of DDR2.

 

[ArisVer]

If you want the speed of a RAM disk, invest in an SSD, and you'll have it.

Words of wisdom.

 

[AlienTech]

Adding the laptop ram to a desktop using an adapter is a bad idea unless your desktop is slow to begin with. The adapter will make the latency higher than the standard ram on the desktop. When the computer boots up it will add all the ram to memory and show you a bigger memory space but some of that will be slow ram and any access to those areas will end up slowing down the system. In the old days we could buy ram expanders which added ram to the system via a card and a driver and you could use it as a ram disk or disk cache and came in really useful. Never seen one of those for new systems. But I have seen a few raid cards with built in cache and they used these laptop dimm;s on them. You will have to search for those, but they usually come with the armount of tam already but someone might sell you just the card, that way you could use that ram to cache disk data. But that also means adding a new sata controller to the desktop instead of using the built in sata ports. It would end up beign cheaper to just buy higher density desktop dimm's.. We did not have the benefit of large address spaces and memory slots before.. But those are irrelevant now for most users.

 

[secretagent]

Thank you all for your answers, I've learnt a lot. I understand that it's a bad idea to use my ddr2 laptop ram in a desktop, and finding a laptop that accepts 8gbs of ddr2 will be difficult, but is there a way to use my ram Without actually inserting it into my laptop/desktop? Is there some sort of external adaptor that I can just stick ram into and plug it in via usb to access? I don't really want more ram in my system(s) ram, I'm just trying to make it into a ramdisk. If it's not possible, let me know if I should just recycle it.Also, if I was to sell it, would it be worth anything?

 

[secretagent]

This is all just an experiment. I already have an SSD and I really enjoy its blazing fast speeds. I don't need a RAM Disk and I never will, this is not permanent. I just want to see if it's possible.