[SunRescue] sparc 5 memory...

[Dave Reader]

On Fri, 9 Feb 2001, kebabthesheep wrote:

> Hi all,
> 
> After contacting a mate at sun uk, I was told that the sparc5 takes ordinary jedec dimms, of 4x72
> pin format.  It uses 64 bits of the 72 for data, and 2 for parity.  He also said, that he has used
> PC memory in a sparc5 and visa versa, and that the 'fact' that sparc5 ram is special, is just a
> myth.  (and a profitable one at that)  
> 
> Has anyone any experience of using PC 32Mb parity dimms in a sparc5?  What about the sparc4?  I
> was lead to believe it was a 'cut-down' cheap sparc5, but that somehow there *IS* something odd
> about it's memory requirements.  
> 
> I'm confused by all this - I don't want to spend hundreds of pounds on ram for a couple of slow
> suns, which I was given for free, but equally I want to play with solaris 7/8...

I looked into this a little a while back.

They need 5v dimms, and they must be parity types.

IIRC they should also be FPM _not_ EDO. (i would have to check this again
to be sure)

Yes, they are JEDEC standard dimms, but hard to find it seems... The
positioning of the little cut-outs in the dimm and the corresponding key
in the socket prevents you from fitting the wrong type.

PowerMac memory is almost right -- it just isnt parity, so no
good. Apparently the ANS used parity memory.. but given the rarity and
expense of these (there was one on ebay.co.uk recently) that's hardly a
likely source of cheap memory :)

I haven't yet found any suitable ex-PC memory which I can try. The only 5v
dimms I have found to date on the second-hand market have been 64bit
modules or something strange.


dave.