[X4U] RAM Memory

Stroller macmonster at myrealbox.com
Wed Jul 18 17:54:29 PDT 2007


On 18 Jul 2007, at 23:08, Zane H. Healy wrote:

> At 10:45 PM +0100 7/18/07, Stroller wrote:
>> Just upgraded my CoreDuo (_not_ Core2Duo) MacBook to 2gig of RAM.
>>
>> Woah! What a difference it makes!
>
> How much RAM did you have prior to the upgrade?  What really got me  
> was Apple selling them with 512MB, yet having 1GB in the demo  
> models in the stores.  At least now 1GB seems to be the base.

Sorry - I meant to say.

Just the 512meg it was shipped with.

When I ordered the lappy a year ago Apple's price for extra RAM was  
(of course) just silly, and as I recall even 3rd-party RAM was  
prohibitive. At £55 for 2gig now it's not worth buying half as much,  
IMO - I think a year ago RAM was more like twice the price and at the  
time (having just lunched out £950 for the laptop and Applecare) £120  
for 2gig was a bit more than I was prepared to spend.

With 512meg already fitted "free" the cost-benefit was loaded against  
the expense (of £60, I think) just to double the RAM to 1gig. I  
figured that since 512meg definitely and very clearly makes a big  
difference for Windows XP I;d be happy with that - when the MacBook  
arrived I was quickly surprised how sluggish it was.

I have always intended to stick with dual-channel - probably the  
difference would be unnoticeable, but dual-channel is "the best" - in  
this laptop and to max out the RAM to 2gig as soon as I could afford it.

I can't help wondering now that I've seen the results of Activity  
Monitor whether 1gig of RAM would've been just as good. Activity  
Monitor seems to indicate that 1gig is the sweet-spot, but I can't be  
bothered now to pull one of the sticks I fitted and besides it would  
be impossible to get an objective judgement when my important  
consideration is "snappiness".

Stroller.



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