Hi TheDuck ......that is the $64,000 question.

Whoa, a 200 dollar upgrade for ram... And what if it's not the RAM, It could be faulty RAM slots on the motherboard or HDD, you won't know until after your buy the 200 dollar RAM...
The situation, as I see it, is that Mom has spent maybe $2,500 on this thing, so a RAM upgrade would only be 10% of the purchase price?

It is an industrial strength box, so you can expect it to have a life of 10 years or more. Given that it is not being used a lot, and obviously kept in a nice indoor domestic home environment, it will probably last forever. OK on the shop floor in an engineering works we would be looking at 18~24 months

Why should the RAM slots become faulty?................no upgrading as yet?............if it were the MoBo, why no other strang happenings?........same with the HDD.

Hey, we all know that ME is a resource pig with memory leaks on top, but all you have to do is toss it into a macine with loads of resorce and it WILL behave..........please trust me on that.

Anyway a $200 upgrade for RAM and then put in WIN 2000 and it is sweet? The RAM upgrade will not be wasted, only it might be all that is required. If it is the HDD, so what another $60?

It is NOT the MoBo