Upgrading Laptop Memory

I have a Sony Vaio laptop, model no. VGN-FZ21E bought about 15 months ago with 2GB RAM. I want to upgrade to 4GB RAM (2x 2GB modules).

The Sony site sells 2GB modules for £259. So I'd need to spend £518 to upgrade. A lot! I can't afford that.

Alternatively, Crucial has the 2GB modules it recommends for my model at just £17.24 ea. - i.e. I'd need to spend just £34.48 to get the 4GB RAM I want.

Seems like a no-brainer to go with Crucial, but I remember an IT guy a worked with a few years ago saying that he would never put anything but manufacturer's own memory into a laptop. He was happy to do so in desktops, but never laptops. So basically I'm looking for advice: Is it a good idea to put the cheaper memory into my laptop or should I just stick with what I've got?

Any help appreciated, thanks in advance

 

dude ive upgraded numerous laptops with memory from crucial and had no problems
but like any hardware theres always a few bad apples, but if you really feel the need for the extra ram 35 quid has got to be worth a punt

if you get problems put back your old ram and e-bay the new stuff, as theres no way anybodys spending 500 quid on ram ffsrolleyes

 

Yeah, I was never going to spend £500 on RAM, just wanted reassurance that the £35 option would be ok. Thanks.

 

Then he didn't know what he was talking about. No offense, but what brand you put in your laptop means nothing. The specifications of motherboard and memory are what matters, and when I bought Crucial memory they promised me they would pay return shipping and refund me in full if the parts didn't work in my laptop. They worked great, so I never had a chance to test them on that... I might though, just to see what happens. LOL

Sony charges a premium because they know they can scare people into paying it. Don't let them cheat you, get the cheaper Crucial parts, and use the money you save on buying other toys.

 

Hi Alex,

The guys (an gals) are correct. The only consideration is if the Laptop has sockets for 4 ram sticks.

Good Luck, Jim

 

There's practically no laptops that do. Standard is two slots.

 

I think he is going to replace 2x1GB with 2x2GB
I did that with my laptop but to be honest i did not get the extra that i had hoped.http://smileys.on-my-web.com/repository/Sad/crying-022.gif

 

Yeah, this upgrade may not yield the satisfaction he thinks it will.

Regarding the memory brand question, I'll just add my bit of confirmation to what everyone else has said. I have a Compaq Presario notebook PC running Vista Home Premuim. It came with 1GB of RAM. After owning it for about 17 months, I removed the original memory and installed 2GB of Kingston memory. It works fine.