Sony wanted over $100 to go from 4GB to 8GB, so I figured I’d order the minimum and add it myself. Problem is I can’t duplicate the part since it appears to have been made for them by Sony. Do I have to discard it and buy a matched pair, or can I find something similar in characteristics and just add it.
Here’s what the existing module looks like:
| Kingston 4GB 2Rx8-PC3-12800S-11-11-FS
| SNY1600S11-4GB-EDEG 9995428-132.AOOG
| 5762206-1216 ASSY IN CHINA
|______________________________________
Going to the major manufacturer’s websites (Crucial, Kingston, etc) you’ll get recommendations on exactly what to buy. I stick with Corsair and Crucial for the most part.
Normally, I’d go for a matched pair even if the specs are the same (and possibly the additional memory you’re adding is, in reality, even the same brand as the original. However, you could buy one module first. See if you have problems. If you do try just running on the new module with the original taken out. If it’s fine then you can buy a 2nd one (but buy it from the same place you bought the first one you bought). 98.6 % of the time (yes I pulled that out of thin air) there won’t be a problem. However, rather than troubleshoot a problem which may only occur under certain circumstances, I always do complete replacements.
I do like Crucial since they’re an American company and I’ve never had problems with their stuff. Maybe I should just buy 8 gigs from them and sell the original module on eBay to someone else who didn’t want to pay Sony 4 times the going rate? Or might Sony give me grief if I have to do a warranty return and it comes back full of Crucial memory?
At work I specify Crucial because I have to be right 100% of the time or I’ll never hear the end of it. At home I’ll use Crucial if the price is right, but I use a lot of Corsair too, when I have to be right 99.8% of the time (working on a friends computer which I use depends on what their b1tch potential is if something goes wrong ;).
At work, if I say 8 like laptops, I’ll fill 4 of them with the new memory and 4 of them with the OEM memory, so I like your thinking of selling your original memory on ebay. If warranty became an issue, where I had to actually send it back (which I’ve never had to do, usually the laptop ends up in a swimming pool or something like that) I’d probably recall one of the laptops with 100% OEM memory, then swap the memory into the one I had to send out.