computer parts in china

[euphonius]

OK, it's cold, and dark, and will start raining overnight, so here's an off-topic query:

Any recommendations here inside the firewall for buying quality, authentic computer parts, online or off? I want to boost the RAM in my Macbook Pro to 8gb from 4. Alas, that means chucking the two 2gb chips in there now and replacing with 4gb pieces.

Here's the spec:
204-pin PC3-8500 (1066 MHz) DDR3 SO-DIMM

Taobao (love it or hate it) has not helped me out here, but I did stumble on the local version of newegg.com, a big mail-order house in Los Angeles. Here's what I found on their site:

4gb 1066 MHz DDR3 SODIMM chips

at 299 rmb each for the Chinese-made Kingshare and 369 rmb each for the Korean-made Samsung, these are comparable to US mail order prices of $90-100 (and a lot cheaper than the $400+ that Apple charges).

Any other quality suppliers in China?
Any warnings or cautions about brand or compatibility?

best thanks!

[humanbeing]

Taiwanese brand ADATA is quite good price/ quality than those chinese King???. http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=9246182878 tel: http://360life.taobao.com/
Compatibility: Go to mall & test in shop if u afraid shop online . If booted OK, 99% + chance good.

[euphonius]

Thanks, HB. Nice tip. I'd not found any 4gb chips in taobao. Price is good too, and this shop is in Shanghai so conceivably I can drop by and do the upgrade on the spot.

cheers!

[euphonius]

Dear Humanbeing,

Followup question: These 4gb chips are not widely available in Shanghai, and it looks like Adata has only a 1333MHz version, not the 1066MHz that my Mac requires. In the shop of course they say the 1333 "will work just fine" but I'm skeptical. With a more careful taobao search i've identified quite a few 4gb ram chip choices.

Should I insist on 1066 or is it ok to go with 1333? Price for the 1333 from Kingbridge(?) or Kingstone(?) was 295 rmb.

thanks!

[CantDecide]

Faster chips (1333Mhz) should work fine running at slower speeds, I've done that before, but never in a Mac. I suspect it will work. If you are buying it from a shop, and they install it while you are there, if the laptop starts up at all, you'll be fine. Just check the 'About this Mac' and make sure it says 8gb of ram.

295 rmb seems cheap, is that for two 4gb sticks or just one? For one, that would be comparable to the US, for two, its very cheap.

In the states, NewEgg.com sells Kingston 2x4gb 1066mhz for about $87. (I'm not sure that is the same Kingston you are looking at).

[euphonius]

Dear Josh,

Thanks for the reassurance about clock speed. I've found quite a few Taobao shops offering the 1066 from Samsung for 300-320 per stick. And Newegg.com.cn is in the same neighborhood, a bit higher. So should be able to do this for about $100. Funny, looking through various threads about upgrading -- these same chips were abou $300 only a year or so ago. Next year: $25...

I see you are posting in daytime. You over your jet lag?

cheers!

[CantDecide]

Thanks for the reassurance about clock speed. I've found quite a few Taobao shops offering the 1066 from Samsung for 300-320 per stick. And Newegg.com.cn is in the same neighborhood, a bit higher. So should be able to do this for about $100. Funny, looking through various threads about upgrading -- these same chips were abou $300 only a year or so ago. Next year: $25...

Yeah, memory is funny/depressing like that... We've got sticks of ram lying around the office that cost a couple hundred dollars new, and now they are worthless.

I didn't know there was a newegg.com.cn, I should check it out. I wonder if they have a warehouse here in China. I keep suggesting there is such a market here for my company's warehousing solution, but people at my company are gun shy about the intellectual property issues.

I see you are posting in daytime. You over your jet lag?

Yeah, mostly. I was on a Skype meeting last night around 11 and dozed off, but other than that, I'm pretty adjusted.

[td_ref]

Macs we all known for their delicacy, can you access to Crucial ram?

p.s. google.com and gmail.com are crawling today

[euphonius]

Dear TD,

would love to find Crucial, but don't see what I need in TB. looking at Samsung and Maglite (美光). I've done RAM upgrades in macbooks before with no problems, but I'm reluctant to use a 1333MHz chip when system expects 1066MHz. Of course I know nothing about RAM and how clock speeds actually work, etc, etc....

[CantDecide]

Euphonius,

I take back what I said before. It SHOULD work, and it MIGHT work, but I guess Apple's boot process can be a bit finicky. I found a few links online:

http://discussions.apple.com/message...ageID=10821129

http://www.mactalk.com.au/24/82168-t...09-models.html

So personally, I would be quite surprised if the 1333 didn't work, BUT if you want to err on the safe side, I'd find 1066 ram.

I've got 8gb of 1066mhz ram in my Macbook Pro, you can order me some 1333 mhz ram and I'll send you my 1066.

As for how it works, often-times the chips come off the exact same manufacturing line, at the same time. During final validation, the QA process tests the chips at varying speeds until they fail, and then mark them at whatever speed they are comfortable rating them at.

I don't know if you remember the days of 486SX and 486DX processors, but the DX had an on-board floating point processor and the SX didn't. Supposedly, the SX and DX actually had the same manufacturing process, and both actually had the extra processor, but if test showed the floating point processor was bad, they would disable it and sell the chip as an SX:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_80486SX

Anyway, as far as I understand it, chip speed verification is basically the same thing... if the chip likes the faster speed, it gets rated faster. Naturally, there are fewer chips that like the higher speed, so the price is higher.