Adapting laptop SODIMM to work in a desktop, is it possible? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / projects

author: rwgast_lowlevellogicdesin
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 26, 2013, 08:36:56 pm
content: This is probably a goofey question but non the less I would like to take a shot at it, if it is reasonable. Ive been in a bad financial situation for quite a while and I have had to revert to an older HP desktop running XP with an AMD 2ghz single core and a gig of ram. A while back I did some work on a guys laptop including upgrading the ram, one of the stick I ordered for him was DOA, so I sent it back and had a replacement mailed out. Well it has been a year and the customer has never come back for his third gig of ram. It has just been sitting going to waste so I started thinking..... the ram is the same speed ddr2 that my desktop uses. As far as I know the only difference in laptop and PC ram is the form factor. I was wondering if it would be possible to solder up some kind of adapter or even just small wires to the chip and connect it to my desktop PC's Mother Board.While the idea seems reasonable, I cant find any production SODIMM to regular DIMM adapters on the net. So I started thinking since this is hi speed maybe an adapter is not possible because it would locate the ram to far from the bus, maybe soldering wires to the leads of the ram would add to much capacitance, Im not sure? Like I said the idea seems simple enough but I am not uber hi speed digital engineer, only a hobbyist, I was hoping some one may be able to shed some light on what problems I may face.

author: dr.diesel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 26, 2013, 08:48:37 pm
content: RAM is so cheap the adapter would cost more then just buying proper memory.

author: M. András
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 26, 2013, 08:55:56 pm
content: yeah depends on speed size etc 32gigs of ram cost me 300bucks converted from our currency

author: mariush
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 26, 2013, 10:01:47 pm
content: You must really suck at buying stuff then.They're 130 uk pounds and more on Amazon UK... that's 200$+http://www.amazon.co.uk/Patriot-Extreme-Performance-PC3-12800-Latency/dp/B001B2LPVE/ref=sr_1_389?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1364335089&sr=1-389http://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-BLS4C8G3D1609ES2LX0BEU-1600MHz-Ballistix-Memory/dp/B00A14ZUJ6/ref=sr_1_390?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1364335089&sr=1-390

author: Teemo
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: March 26, 2013, 11:02:49 pm
content: Quote from: rwgast_lowlevellogicdesin on March 26, 2013, 08:36:56 pmThe idea is interesting, but I do not think it is easily doable. It possibly makes more sence to trade that ram with someone.If you still want to do it, there is too many pins to just solder in with wires! Only way to go is to design special PCB and must have socket for sodimm. Find out electrical datasheets for both types first, and see if those are compatible.

author: nukie
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 26, 2013, 11:08:43 pm
content: Are you sure you search??! Because when I googled there are plenty of sodimm to dimm adapters.

author: Fsck
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 27, 2013, 12:44:42 am
content: quick google shows:http://www.amazon.com/ValueAMP-DDR3-204pin-SODIMM-adapter/dp/B005F0E26S

author: amspire
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 27, 2013, 01:09:40 am
content: Quote from: Fsck on March 27, 2013, 12:44:42 amThat adapter costs $15 and we are only talking about a 1G RAM module.You can buy 4G of quality RAM for under double that price.I think the adapter has to degrade the RAM performance or reliability a little.

author: gnif
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 27, 2013, 05:50:53 am
content: Doing this with wires would cause signal integrity issues, DDR traces are length matched so that the timing is precise, I highly doubt it would work.