Upgrading RAM on most computers is often quite a straightforward task: look up the supported modules, purchase them, push a couple of levers, remove the old, and install the new. However, this project submitted by [Mads Chr. Olesen] is anything but a simple.
In this project, he sets out to double the RAM on a Olimex A20-OLinuXino-LIME2 single-board computer. The Lime2 came with 1 GB of RAM soldered to the board, but he knew the A20 processor could support more and wondered if simply swapping RAM chips could double the capacity. He documents the process of selecting the candidate RAM chip for the swap and walks us through how U-Boot determines the amount of memory present in the system.
While your desktop likely has RAM on removable sticks, the RAM here is soldered to the board. Swapping the chip required learning a new skill: BGA soldering, a non-trivial technique to master. Initially, the soldering didn’t go as planned, requiring extra steps to resolve issues. After reworking the soldering, he successfully installed both new chips. The moment of truth arrived—he booted up the LIME2, and it worked! He now owns the only LIME2 with 2 GB of RAM.
Be sure to check out some other BGA soldering projects we’ve featured over the years.
I’m impressed by the work, but would like to know the use case.
Learn a new skill, show off the skill. Not everything must have an use case, sometimes “because why not?” is a perfect valid reason.
That’s fair enough. I was just hoping for some special task/hack that only an upgraded SBC could accomplish.
The 1 GB was slowing down the system for certain applications, running HomeAssistant, Grafana, Graphite at the same time. It’s not much faster, but the additional GB does provide some room for caching.
And to be honest I was expecting some reason for it not to work out in the end – but it did!
Kind of like when I upped my Casio C120 Windows CE palmtop from 2 to 6MB. Good times!