My way of explaining it is to use a desk and a file cabinet.  The desktop
(RAM) is your work space, everything you need is right there, quickly
accessible.  The file cabinet is your disk space.  It can hold a lot more
than your desk but is farther away, and when you want to work on something,
you have to stand up, walk to the file cabinet and bring it to the desk.
Oh, and every night, someone comes by and wipes everything off of your desk
(turning off the machine clears out RAM).  You could also add that there is
an assistant (cache) that stands between your desk and the file cabinet.
He anticipates what you'll need and pulls it out of the file cabinet.

It may be simplistic but it's worked for explaining it to beginners.  It's
something they can associate with and in a way also helps explain why drive
space and RAM are both measured in bytes (KB, MB, GB).

Oscar Ricardo Silva
[log in to unmask]

>I have to give a speech explaining the difference between disk
>space and Ram memory. While I understand this topic, I have not
>yet come up with an explanation that my 13 year old daughter can
>grasp.
>Does anyone have an easy to understand analogy for how ram works?

                                  -----
       **Need help with PCBUILD mailing list? Send an Email to:**
        Bob Wright<[log in to unmask]> or Drew Dunn<[log in to unmask]>