Looking for a Angled DDR socket conversion

[aggie113]

Ok, so I'm basically trying to finish up a g4 (quicksilver, non-mirror) intel mod I did awhile ago. Sitting in it is a nice 865 motherboard along with 2 sticks of corsair low latency memory. The memory is standard height and here is the issue. To get an internal optical drive I'd really need to either find some way of making those dimm slots angled or cut into the casing of the optical drive and hope there is enough space in there to allow a fit. I've just tried googling for an option on finding some sort of angled dimm add on or something to convert the motherboard. All I've found are a few postings of makers of the angled sockets themselves, but I don't want/can't rip out the dimm sockets I have now and replace them, that just sounds too hairy for me. Anyone have any ideas on where to find/how to make my straight sockets angled, something that doesn't involve pliers?

 

[aggie113]

still lookin

 

[Peter]

Short of removing the sockets from the board, and then soldering angled ones into their place, you can alternatively look for "low profile" DIMMs that use BGA packaged RAM chips rather than big old TSOPs.

 

[aggie113]

what are the chances of finding such dimms that are also low latency and the speed i'm looking for? i've thought of low profile but i don't think that would give me enough room in the case. guess i'm gonna just have to start cutting into an optical drive to make room. unless anyone knows of a slim optical drive with a tray that has a motor in it (for pushing open the apple bay door)?

 

[Peter]

May I suggest you check the usual suspects (Kingston, Crucial, whoever else) for low profile, unbuffered, PC3200. The "low latency" thing got a tad overhyped, and you got other priorities there.

 

[Odeen]

Remember, the P4 was originally designed for RDRAM chipsets - that is high bandwidth, high latency. Going from CAS2 to CAS3 doesn't hurt a P4 as much as it hurts a K7.

That said, if you want absolute top-notch performance, a) why did you go for PAT-less or PAT-emulating (but, arguably, not true PAT) i865, and b) why restrict yourself to building it inside a G4? Generally speaking, "show" computers are not as much about performance as they are about their "theme." As you've noticed, it's hard to get both.

-Alex

 

[someone16]

For BGA chips, look for Kingmax ram? REviews say they're pretty good

 

[CommandoCATS]

I have the same kind of conversion (P4 to quicksilver) and I don't even low profile DIMMs are low profile enough to allow you to fit an optical drive in there. Also, on many (most) mATX boards, the power connector gets in the way.